A perk of being an ex-President is being able to monetize your time in office after you get out.
One way of doing that is by writing a memoir, and according to Politico, Donald Trump might be considering a unique way of doing that.
Self-publishing.
Why would he forgo millions of dollars in an advance and not sign on with an established publishing house? Well, reportedly because he’s worried the advance he would receive would be smaller than the $60 million former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle received from Penguin Random House.
Yes, that’s the primary reason, according to Politico.
A story in The Guardian this past June hinted that major publishers were worried that Trump might push false and unproven claims in a book he would write about the 2020 election and if he felt it was stolen from him. That could ward off big advances as well.
In the 11 months Trump has been out of office, he has released one book, a photo book on his four years in the White House, with captions that he wrote. Winning Team Publishing published that book. A former campaign aid of Trump and a friend of Donald Jr. run that company.
Trump Sr. has his own media company now, the Trump Media and Technology Group, so he potentially has an outlet that could self-publish his memoir.
Here’s what a publishing executive told Politico about his belief that the advance is something that might be a sticking point for Trump.
“My suspicion is Trump is self-publishing because he doesn’t want the humiliation of getting a smaller advance than he has before or anyone finding out that it is smaller than Obama’s, I imagine that’s as big a part of it as anything.”
One thing that wasn’t discussed in the Politico story is this. Maybe publishing companies are worried that Trump would demand a larger advance than Obama, based on anticipated advanced sales of a book that would be a whole lot juicier than what previous Presidents have cranked out?
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