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After 15 months running the Justice Department for the president, Attorney General Bill Barr was also worried in April 2020 that Trump was sabotaging his reelection chances. He needed a come-to-Jesus meeting.

Barr consulted two people about what he should say to Trump, first his wife of 47 years, Christine, a librarian, who was close friends with Robert Mueller’s wife, Ann.

“You can’t save someone from themselves,” Christine told her husband. “This guy is set in his ways and he is what he is, and you’re not going to change that.”

“I know,” Barr said. “I’m going to try.” He would continue to run Justice the way he thought was in the best interest of both Trump and the administration, and then, “hopefully, he’ll have a shot at being reelected.”

Barr confided, though, that he felt a little bitter. “I’ve been around long enough not to hold grudges, but I feel I and a lot of others went in there to help this guy, sort of acclimate him to the Washington system.” Guide Trump about its boundaries. The problem, he said, was Trump’s “own pigheadedness and his blindness.”

Barr remembered how he mounted a similar effort 28 years ago with President George H. W. Bush, when Barr had been attorney general for the first time.

Jack Kemp, then the housing secretary, and Barr had gone to see Bush after a cabinet meeting in March 1992, when Bush was leading in the polls for his own reelection bid.

“Mr. President, on the current trajectory, we think you’re going to lose,” Barr said. Kemp echoed him. Bush had been shocked. Their message was that he had to pay a lot more attention to domestic affairs and the economy. It turned out to be good advice. Bush lost in part because he failed to have a coordinated message on the economy.

Barr checked with Jared Kushner, who said the way was clear to go talk to Trump alone. Kushner said Trump needed to hear it, and he was going to have other officials swing by. But Barr would be the leadoff batter of the soft intervention because he might get a hit.

Barr went into the little dining room off the Oval Office and took a seat. He steeled himself because Trump’s usual approach when the president detected someone coming with an unwelcome recommendation, or something he didn’t want to hear, was to filibuster.

“No filibustering, Mr. President, please,” Barr said. “I really hope that you take to heart what I say, because it’s important for me that you listen.”

Trump nodded and signaled he would listen.

“Mr. President, I think you’re on a trajectory to lose the election. I travel probably more than any other cabinet secretary around the country. And I’m talking to Joe Six Pack kind of guys. You know, cops and stuff like that. I have yet to meet one of your supporters who doesn’t come up to me and, say, ‘You know, we love the president, we love you. We want our selfie. You know, thank God. God bless you.’ ”

But Barr said “these people whisper, ‘Would you please tell the president to dial it back? Would you please tell him not to tweet as much? He’s his own worst enemy.’

“This election is about the suburbs,” Barr said. “You know you’re going to bring in your base and you don’t gain anything by continuing to be more and more outrageous. And I think you have some repair work to do among Republican and independent voters who like your policies generally.”

Barr paused and delivered his summary line: “They just think you’re a fucking asshole.”

Trump did not seem taken aback or insulted.

“In my opinion,” Barr said, “this is not a base election. Your base is critical, and you’ll get it out. And there are a lot of people out there, independents and Republicans in the suburbs of the critical states that think you’re an asshole. They think you act like an asshole and you got to, you got to start taking that into account.

“You know, you pride yourself in being a fighter and that worked in 2016 when they wanted a disruptor to go in there. And they still want a disruptor, but they don’t want someone who is a complete asshole. And so, you have to turn on the other thing you do very well, which is to woo people. And I think that’s what this election is about. And you know, my concern is that in some ways you become a captive of the Beltway in that you have all these self-anointed spokespeople for your base who come and tell you what they want. They are drowning you in their needs.”

Barr was thinking of some of these interest groups who had an open door to the West Wing—the gun groups, the Judicial Watch leader going after liberals inside the federal bureaucracy, Fox News personalities.

“The other basic theme,” Barr said, “and I know this is self-serving because I know you’re impatient about the work we’re doing over at the department. But I actually think that the people, the mom and pops up in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and Michigan, they don’t give a shit.” Don’t care about prosecuting former FBI director James Comey and others for their handling of the Russia investigation.

“Your base cares about seeing Comey and the rest of these guys held accountable, but these other people don’t. They don’t care about your fucking grievances. And it just seems that every time you’re out there, you’re talking about your goddamn grievances. They’re worried about their future. They’re worried about the economy now with Covid and stuff like that.

“You should be talking about what you did pre-Covid, how you’re the guy to bring the country back after Covid, that you have a demonstrated track record and then give them a vision of where you’re going to take the country. And that’s all you should be talking about, not all this other shit, not every grievance you have.”

“Bill,” Trump responded, “these people are vicious. I’ve got to fight. I need my base. My base wants me to be strong. These are my people.”

“Here’s my assessment, Mr. President,” Barr said. “I think you were able to pull it off at the last minute, after ‘grab them by the pussy’ last time, because that sobered you up and you realized you didn’t know everything, and you started actually listening to people like Kellyanne and others. And so, you behaved yourself for about one month. And that was just enough because the electorate was fluid. I’m afraid there are two things that are different this time, and this is why I’m talking to you now.

“The electorate is not as fluid. Last time, they didn’t know you as a public figure and they were willing to give you a chance. Now, a lot of people have made up their minds about you. They think they know who you are. So, they’re not as fluid. And the other thing that’s different, and I think the thing that’s the main problem, is you think you’re a fucking genius, politically.

“You think you’re a genius and so you’re not going to listen to anybody. You think you know what they want. And I think you’re wrong. I have yet to meet one of your supporters who hasn’t said that to me. And these are people who do like you and they actually tolerate your bullshit. But it’s toleration. They don’t support you because you act that way. And I think unless you, you know, unless you sort of go on a charm offensive and start trying to patch up some of the damage that’s happened in some of these suburbs, I think you’re going to lose.”

“I need to be a fighter,” Trump said. “I’ve gotten where I am because I’m willing to fight. They like that I’m willing to fight. I have to fight.” His advisers, he said, told him if he got 65 million votes, he would win.

Barr believed that meant the advisers thought Trump could win by stoking the base and getting new registrations in rural areas. “It’s not a static playing field,” Barr warned. “The other side is working, too.”