The September 9–22 issue of New York is a special dual political cover with features by Olivia Nuzzi and Rebecca Traister, each examining the historic upending of the presidential race over the summer and how we got to the current moment. Traister writes a sweeping deep dive into the grassroots movements, primarily led by women and people of color, that propelled Kamala Harris’s ascension to the top of the ticket, examining how Democratic politics has been entirely reshaped since the 2016 election by forces far removed from Washington and largely invisible to the pundit class. And Nuzzi sits down with Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago for a revealing and intimate conversation with a man on the brink of self-reflection as he reels from his assassination attempt and the changing shape of the race and grapples with the existence of God.
“I was completely obsessed with the wild atmospheric shift between the paralysis, dread, and capitulation of the Democratic Party after Biden’s disastrous debate performance and the ecstatic explosion of enthusiasm for Harris’s candidacy that happened in a matter of hours on Sunday, July 21,” said Traister. “Anytime something that dramatic happens, it is worth exploring. I read obsessively about the top of the party and the decisions it was making, but I didn’t think that was the whole story. For years, I’ve been reporting on the way that ordinary people had radically changed their relationship to civic participation after Trump’s first electoral win, organizing on the ground with the help of those who had been doing it for decades, and the thing I was pretty sure I was seeing was those people taking control of the wheel.”
“This is the third feature in my ongoing series of interviews with Donald Trump about his 2024 campaign,” said Nuzzi. “He did not like my last feature very much (he called me “dumb as rocks” and “unattractive” in response) so it took a little while for him to agree to sit down with me for a follow up. But I knew he’d come around eventually.”
Nuzzi’s feature is accompanied by a portrait of the former President painted in Mar a Lago by the artist Isabelle Brourman, whose courtroom sketches ran in this magazine throughout the trial.
“On a roadtrip to the RNC in Milwaukee, we dreamt up the idea to ask the Trump campaign to do something unorthodox: While I conducted an interview with the candidate, Isabelle would paint his portrait in real time,” said Nuzzi.
“This story is based on extensive interviews with Trump at Mar-a-Lago and by phone, as well as interviews conducted in the weeks after the assassination attempt with members of his inner circle, campaign staff, and medical team. Much of this piece is about whether people can change, and what it means when a person as resistant to change as Donald Trump has change thrust upon him. I hope people will read it with an open mind and curiosity about a person who we all can agree is among the most unusual to ever live — and even Trump agrees with that; I asked him on the phone a few weeks ago and he said he accepts that he’s “unusual” — just don’t call him “weird.”
The cover consists of two photographs of the candidates. Harris is photographed by Mark Peterson/redux and Trump by Julia Nikhinson/AP Photo.
Elsewhere in the issue, Beth Raymer writes a powerful personal essay on how her father privately tapped the family’s phone lines and the secrets those tapes revealed after his death.