Hey, at the very least, this would make an excellent villain origin story.
President Donald Trump got pretty salty Monday night after learning about an embarrassing claim author Michael Wolff made about him and his ongoing vendetta against Harvard University.
During an interview with “The Daily Beast” podcast last week, Wolff, who has written several books about Trump, said the reason why the president has such a “grudge” against the Ivy League institution is because it hurt his feelings. Or, as Wolff put it, “he didn’t get into Harvard.”
“He needs an enemy,” Wolff said earlier in the podcast. “That’s what makes the show great. The Trump show. He picks fantastic enemies, actually. And Harvard, for all it represents, fits right into the Trump show,” he said.
“Going after Harvard has proved to be an incredibly reliable headline,” he added. “So he’s on the money. So he’s done what he set out to do. Dominate headlines.”
Wolff’s remarks seemed to get Trump’s hackles up.
“Michael Wolff, a Third Rate Reporter, who is laughed at even by the scoundrels of the Fake News, recently stated that the only reason I’m ‘beating up’ on Harvard, is because I applied there, and didn’t get in,” Trump wrote on his website, Truth Social, Monday. “That story is totally FALSE, I never applied to Harvard. I graduated from the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania.”
Trump continued, obviously not bothered at all, “He is upset because his book about me was a total ‘BOMB.’ Nobody wanted it, because his ‘reporting’ and reputation is so bad!”
Bloomberg via Getty Images
Harvard has certainly gotten Trump’s panties in a twist.
In April, the Trump administration claimed an investigation found that the Ivy League institution was engaging in so-called diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices and promoting “antisemitism” on campus. The administration threatened to pull $9 billion in federal grants unless Harvard bent to its will. Harvard refused, which led to Trump getting even more vindictive by freezing its federal funding, telling the IRS to revoke its tax-exempt status, and attempting to bar Harvard from enrolling foreign students.
Elsewhere in the podcast, Wolff also claimed that he started the rumor that the reason why Trump was targeting Harvard was because his youngest son, Barron, applied and didn’t get in — a claim that first lady Melania Trump has denied.
“That nugget comes from me,” Wolff said. “That exists because I reported that that was the joke within the White House.”
He added, “I actually don’t know if there’s any truth in this, which there very well might be, but within the White House that became the joke… Because they were like, ‘What is he doing? This is crazy stuff. Why would this be happening?’ and then they tell the Barron joke.”