Mary Trump said she thinks her uncle genuinely believes he won the election, and that he's the only person she knows 'who can gaslight himself'
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- Mary Trump, President Trump's niece, told VICE News on Monday that she believes her uncle has tricked himself into believing he won the 2020 presidential election.
- President-elect Joe Biden won the election nearly a month ago, and the US government is already transitioning to Biden's team.
- But President Donald Trump still refuses to concede and continues to make baseless accusations of widespread voter fraud.
- Mary Trump, who is a clinical psychologist, said her uncle was programmed not to show weakness, which is why he won't admit defeat.
- "He's the only person I've ever met who can gaslight himself," Mary Trump told VICE News on Monday, adding: "Probably the most central part of Donald's psychopathology is the need to deny any reality that paints him as a loser or as somebody who is weak."
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President Donald Trump's estranged niece, Mary, says her uncle hasn't conceded the 2020 presidential election because he truly believes that he has won.
"He's the only person I've ever met who can gaslight himself," Mary Trump told VICE News in an interview on Monday. "I don't think he's ever accepted the truth of the loss. I don't think he's psychologically or emotionally capable of that."
Mary Trump, a Democrat and the daughter of Trump's late older brother Fred Trump Jr., has been speaking out against her uncle publicly since she published a book about him this summer, "Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man."
In her book, Mary Trump shared details of the president's upbringing and her opinions on how it might have impacted his personality, based on her expertise as a clinical psychologist.
One of the core themes of the book is that the president's father, Fred Trump Sr., trained his son never to show weakness.
Accepting defeat, she said, would be a sign of weakness, so Mary is convinced that her uncle will never concede to President-elect Joe Biden.
"Donald is a deeply damaged person," Mary Trump told VICE News. "Probably the most central part of Donald's psychopathology is the need to deny any reality that paints him as a loser or as somebody who is weak."
Decision Desk HQ called the election for Biden on November 6, and major news networks followed a day later.
Since then, the president has refused to concede, launching lawsuits in multiple swing states to challenge the results of the election where the vote counts are closest — but none have succeeded.
On November 23, the Trump administration also officially authorized the presidential to Biden's team, but the letter enabling the move does not acknowledge Biden's election victory.
Trump has alleged that Biden stole the election through widespread voter fraud, but even his own attorney general Bill Barr admitted to the Associated Press on Tuesday that the Justice Department has uncovered no evidence of widespread voter fraud that would change the outcome of the election.
Though he hasn't publicly accepted his loss, Trump has started hinting at a potential run in 2024. Mary Trump told VICE News she doesn't think he'll follow through on that threat.
"If he does announce a run, I don't think it should be taken seriously," she said. "I don't think he'd put himself in a position of losing again, which he'd be doing if he ran again."
However, Mary Trump said she was worried that her uncle may take his anger at losing out on the American people in his last weeks in office.
"If Donald feels rejected by the American people, he's not going to distinguish people who voted for him from people who didn't," Mary Trump said. "He's going to take all of us down with him."
- Read more:
- Trump won't run for president in 2024 because he's too scared to 'lose like this again,' his niece Mary says
- Mary Trump says her uncle, President Trump, will spend the transition period 'breaking stuff' with 'vengeance'
- Mary Trump says President Donald Trump is likely 'desperate' right now as he has 'no one to bail him out'
- Trump's niece, Mary, says the COVID-19 situation in the US is 'horrible' because the president sees illness as 'a display of unforgivable weakness'
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