Ed West Ed West

What we learnt from Piers Morgan’s interview with Donald Trump

Is Donald Trump the Leicester City of US politics, the 5,000/1 outsider who took everyone by surprise? That was Piers Morgan’s opening question to the likely Republican presidential candidate on ITV last night. The obvious response might be that the Donald is more like Chelsea – loads of money, everyone sorts of hates them, some dubious right-of-centre supporters.

The Morgan interview was presumably part of a plan for softening his image, now that he’s won the GOP base and needs to get more of the centre. There was lots of personal stuff – I’m a nice person, he kept on saying, I’m a people person, I love people – but also a strong and powerful one. And clever, too; it’s puzzling how keen he is to always emphasise his intelligence; puzzling because it seems to be revealing an insecurity.

It was his first outreach to the British public, after half a million people with nothing better to do with their lives signed a petition calling for him to be banned from our dreary, cake-filled island.

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