A journalist who has closely covered President Donald Trump over the last decade says he's "never seen him this scared" before.
Salon's Brian Karem details how the government shutdown, ICE agents beating and detaining citizens (and children), combined with pressure over the Jeffrey Epstein files fallout and his calls to use American cities as "training grounds" for military aggression are all creating a perfect storm. But that's not all.
"Trump’s actions are those of a despot trying to seize total power," Karem writes. "But there’s a deeper reason why recently he’s sounding even more maniacal. He is the proverbial New York sewer rat, cornered and lashing out in a desperate attempt to survive. He also knows he is becoming more vulnerable. But it’s not just his own mortality, shrinking mental acuity and the Jeffrey Epstein case that is scaring him."
The real worries Trump has behind closed doors are actually tied to his fears over looming litigation — in other words — it's not over yet, Karem explains.
Karem has filed a FOIA request through attorney Mark Zaid for materials seized during the FBI Mar-a-Lago search, which were later returned to Trump. Karem reports that his request was met with the president's response that he should "pay $50,000 in a bond just to be able to ask for the service. If the petition were denied, I would still have to forfeit the $50,000."
"I believe the information is of such vital public importance that we filed suit and petitioned for expedited service," Karem writes. "This still means it could take anywhere from two to four years before the case is even heard."
The criminal case he beat in court, following the historic June 8, 2023, indictment on 37 felony counts, is "still causing him to howl like a wild animal with its leg caught in a trap." That was the first time a former U.S. president faced federal charges after the FBI searched his Mar-a-Lago home in August 2022 and "uncovered dozens of boxes of highly classified documents stored in insecure settings," including a bathroom.
The case was ultimately dismissed by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in July 2024, but until then it was considered the strongest criminal case against him.
"He’s apparently still so worried about the case that he’s trying to put up costly roadblocks against someone who has only a chance of getting the information released," Karem writes.
Trump is also not in great physical shape, goes to bed early and shows up to work late — which Karem described as signs of him slowing down.
"As Trump grows older and increasingly more mentally incontinent, he sits in a stew of his own political flatulence while he mumbles incoherent random phrases 'like nothing ever seen before,' while blaming 'the violent radical left' and 'fake media,' along with a dozen other imagined enemies," Karem writes. "Like a good bill collector, he always closes with 'Thank you for your attention to this matter.'”
Karem also points to what happened Wednesday as the government shutdown, when Vice President JD Vance took the podium and addressed the American people — and not Trump.
"Trump’s fear and his declining health show us, at the very least, that Vance is capable of pinch hitting for the sultan of political swat," he writes.
And that is concerning, especially as Trump reportedly told Congress that America is in an "armed conflict" with drug cartels, following the recent attacks on boats in the Caribbean.
"If Vance can step up and, in the words of his own staff after Wednesday’s press briefing, 'look very presidential,' then the administration’s despotic nature will continue to amp up even as Donald Trump continues to wind down," Karem warns.
And his fears over invoking the 25th Amendment are very real, he adds.
"At some point in the not-to-distant future, I was told by a source close to Trump, there is a growing fear that someone in his own inner-circle may whisper the words '25th Amendment,' end the Trump presidency and usher in 'The Age of Ultron' — I mean Vance," Karem writes.