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| On January 4, 2016, in Massachusetts. On the fan signs, in front of the famous blond mane: "The silent majority supports Trump" and "Obama, you're fired," the slogan of his reality show. |
No one was warned. The gilded doors of the royal elevator open to reveal the "elected president", in long black coat. He is surrounded by his bodyguards. This is the first time that Donald Trump deigns to descend from his 66th floor to walk to journalists packed into the lobby behind a red cord. On December 6, he twitted to demand the cancellation of an order: a new presidential plane. "Too expensive," he decided, as a businessman who refuses an estimate. "I want Boeing to do the figure, but that's too much," he says again in front of the cameras. That's it. Immediately, he pivots and resumes the royal lift. Trump has just demonstrated that he would not be fond of symbols of power ... He did not wait to be president of the United States to own his own plane. His name appears in letters larger than those of "Air Force One". The king of the bling-bling is in the process of inventing the low-profile presidency.
The most mocked man in America now has the world at his feet
The most mocked man in America now has the world at his feet. Friends, enemies and even an encounter, already, with a head of government, the Japanese Shinzo Abe. To woo him, all make the move in his tower, until recently called a temple of bad taste. Atrium in pink marble, more than 20 meters high (6 floors), where walleye is omnipresent from the elevator to the windows through the Escalator, the Trump Tower is not only an attraction; It is now the heart of Manhattan.
Property developer Guido Lombardi, one of the oldest residents, disagrees: "Before the election, here, it was already the center of New York. He has been living on the 63rd floor for twenty years, with his wife, Gianna, vice-president of the syndic of condominiums headed, of course, by Donald Trump himself. Guido knows the new president well. On the evening of his election, he organized a party with his Russian neighbor. They had invited about sixty people. "Donald had promised to come, but the secret service agents were opposed because we had not gone to the metal detector," he said.
Inaugurated in 1983, the Trump Tower made the 45th President of the United States the King of Manhattan. She allowed him to emancipate himself from his father, who had been satisfied with a success in the suburbs of Queens. The building is next to Tiffany, his favorite luxury store, which he named his second daughter. Trump is so proud of his tower that he devoted a nearly fifty-page chapter to him in his best-selling book The Art of the Deal, the Bible of Trumpian America. "It is the first building he built, the most successful also," says Barbara Res, who oversaw the work - since then she has quarreled with her former boss. The construction was complicated by the zigzag-shaped façade. At the time, it was a unique project: it housed small boutiques on the ground floor, whereas, usually, it takes a department store to attract customers. In the early 1980s, the US economy was convalescent and the entrepreneur did not have the cash to finance his dream. He became heavily indebted and developed a "reverse marketing strategy" that he later theorized, which was to make amateurs lantern. "The longer the queue, the more I raised prices: I could do it twelve times," he writes.
Soon the tower was filled with stars: Steven Spielberg, Paul Anka, and Bruce Willis, who bought a duplex on the 64th and 65th floors and sold it after two years of construction without ever having lived there. One can still meet Leonardo DiCaprio and his staff of pretty girls with endless legs, when he goes to the Indian billionaires of the 47th floor. "They have a great holiday," says an envious neighbor. Leo was still in Trump's office last week trying to convince him ... of the harmful effects of climate change this time around.
Since the election, everything has changed in the Trump Tower
"What is special here is that all nationalities are represented. The families "old money" [aristocrats] live on Park Avenue or Madison, where it is more expensive, but more noisy, "testifies Guido Lombardi. As soon as it was commercialized, Trump targeted the international clientele. "We saw very early a wave of French, because of the election of François Mitterrand, a dangerous man, because he is not only socialist but he sells to the highest bidder of nuclear technology," he wrote in " The Art of the Deal. " The future head of the White House, already very much in vehemence, has also sold much to the Japanese, whom he does not however appreciate: "because they never laugh." He had a lot of fun in making the rumor - unfounded, but excellent for sales - of the arrival of Prince Charles, freshly married to Diana. Promoter, he works on the 26th floor, in offices connected by a special elevator to his triplex of the summit.
We read everywhere that this penthouse measures 3,000 square meters; In reality, according to his neighbor Guido Lombardi, he would make "only" half. Marble and gilded, this palace is more like Louis XIV than the Presbyterian ancestors of Donald. It would be one of the most expensive apartments in New York. Staff would use skates to avoid scratching the ground. At the edge of an interior fountain decorated with cherubs, Michael Jackson spent hours searching for inspiration while watching the panoramic view ... Trump rented the apartment for $ 100,000 a month, but he always left his door ajar for Allow him to enter his house at any hour of the day. The billionaire said: "I have no need to live in a living room 24 meters long, but the simple fact of having one gives me immense pleasure. "He is the first president in the history of the United States who will feel cramped at the White House, and will even have every reason to find it austere.
Since the election, everything has changed in the Trump Tower. The lobby has become a circus. The "jobseekers" in the future government succeed one another. These billionaires must, as in the reality show "The Apprentice", incur the humiliation of scrolling in front of the cameras before and after their appointment with the boss. They are easily recognized: they have the physics of employment. For Trump, appearances matter: he made the position of Secretary of State (Minister of Foreign Affairs) appear to Mitt Romney, his republican rival, his declared enemy, only because he had the look of a patrician who Could have made him a very chic representative of America, before preferring Rex Tillerson (CEO of ExxonMobil). Trump wants to see all the postulants, and wants the whole world to know. He even wants the observers to follow the meanders of his thought at the will of his Tweet. This method of recruitment is original: George W. Bush and Barack Obama were content to personally receive the happy finalists.
On the 26th floor, candidates wait their turn, sometimes long. Sean Spicer, a close friend of the transition team, tells us that "the appointments take place in Donald Trump's office, usually in the presence of Reince Priebus [his chief of staff] and Steve Bannon [his special adviser]" . The new president also relies on the advice of his daughter Ivanka and his son-in-law Jared Kushner. Robert Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television, an audiovisual group that primarily targets the black population, testifies: "He began the interview by asking me if I thought he would win. I answered "no". It made him smile. Then, without any other frills, he asked me if I would be interested in joining the government. "Some are creative, like Sonny Perdue, the former governor of Georgia, wearing a tie stamped with tractor designs to apply to the Ministry of Agriculture ...
Twenty-six floors below, in the great hall, it is the profound America that floods. Last week, Eileen, a retired Maryland resident, was pleasantly surprised, celebrating her birthday at Trump Grill, the restaurant at the atrium where Donald's father Fred Sitting next to Donald Jr., the eldest son. He had come to lunch there with his wife, Vanessa, and their son Tristan, 5 years old. "The little man ordered salmon!" She exclaimed, still shocked. At this age, it is incredible, it must already have a very refined palate. She was enthusiastic about this little Lord Fauntleroy "so well-bred", and so elegant with his Oxford shirt.
A few tables sat another Trump, Eric, the younger, beside a guest with whom he talked business. Entering the Trump Tower is almost part of the family, while approaching power. This is evidenced by the bodyguards with their heads, petrified and watching. That does not prevent, on the scene, the Naked Cowboy Robert John Burck to continue to make the clown. This time he sang the serenade in slip and hat while rolling his muscles. Formerly based in Times Square, not far away, the showman migrated to the Trump Tower, "because there is more atmosphere".
This barnum does not please everyone. The tower apartments currently have trouble finding buyers. 56th Street, where residents enter, was blocked from traffic. 4 x 4 armored blacks, bristling with impressive antennae, are ready to start at any moment according to the desiderata of the master of the places. Recently, an Indian billionaire stole a crisis because it had waited ten minutes, in the rain, that the new president leaves the premises. But it is said that Donald drags his feet to move to Washington. He had two dreams of childhood: living in a tower in his name on Central Park and becoming President of the United States. Today he has to choose. Friend Guido Lombardi smiled: "Not only are we delighted that he is entering the White House, but we all hope that he will go there as soon as possible! The billionaires want to live in Versailles. Not at Fort Knox.
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