How Roy Cohn's Playbook Shapes Trump’s Current Cabinet and Tactics

In "American Scoundrel," Kai Bird and Susan Goldmark depict Roy Marcus Cohn as a master of political dirty tricks who mentored Donald Trump during the latter’s early real-estate career. The book argues that Cohn’s playbook—relentless falsehoods, intimidation of enemies, and refusal to admit error—has become the template for Trump’s second-term governance. Recent appointments, including Todd Blanche as attorney general, illustrate a cabinet populated by figures ready to weaponize the law against opponents.

The authors contrast this with Trump’s first term, citing Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan’s research on a more restrained staff, and they link Trump’s current tactics to the anti-establishment demagogy pioneered by Senator Joseph McCarthy and amplified by Cohn. By drawing parallels between historical red-scare tactics and today’s “Trumpism,” the analysis suggests a persistent thread of fear-driven populism in U.S. politics.