My New Book—Out Today!

"American Reckoning: Inside Trump’s Trial—and My Own" is more than my trial diary. It’s a hopeful cry from the heart at this national moment of truth.

My new book, American Reckoning: Inside Trump’s Trial—and My Own, is out today. It’s very different from anything I’ve tried before, and not just because I wrote it in a kind of fever dream this past summer after sitting every day in the courtroom just 25 feet away from the most dangerous man in the history of the republic.

This one is much more personal and passionate than my previous books — an acerbic take on the felony trial, a cri de coeur for democracy, and an exploration of my crisis of faith in the common sense of roughly half of the American people.

I’ve included a lot of new material beyond what I wrote during the trial and offer fresh details of what I call “Black Swan Summer,” when Nancy Pelosi brilliantly maneuvered Joe Biden off the ticket.

For context, I briefly explore my coming-of-age in a political family in Chicago and some of my strange encounters with nine American presidents.

The book was cathartic to write and, I hope, cathartic to read. It’s the story of how a tawdry trial about hush money payments to a porn star became an inspiring if provisional locus of democratic accountability — a place where, for the first time since his father died twenty-five years ago, Donald Trump was forced to sit down, shut up, and face the consequences of his actions.

Witnessing the jury foreperson saying “Guilty, Guilty, Guilty” 34 times was perhaps the most dramatic and inspiring moment of my 45 years in journalism.

Win or lose, Trump will, finally, be sentenced on November 26. If he wins, Judge Juan Merchan will likely sentence him to probation. If he loses, the odds favor him going to jail for a few months.

If that doesn’t motivate you to stop wringing your hands and start ringing doorbells (or using the computer call tool to call voters in battleground states), I don’t know what will.

Here’s a brief excerpt:

The main difference between our current challenges and what we’ve faced in the past is that all of the haters and demagogues and con men in our history have operated at a level below that of the president of the United States. In that sense, Trump presents unique threats that, of necessity, involve far more of us than were needed to confront, say, Huey Long or Joe McCarthy, or the broader “paranoid style” that has always been present on the fringes of American politics.

After the Jack Smith case was delayed, it became a truism in the commentariat that no trial could stop Trump. Only the voters could do that. Truisms are often true, but this one is incomplete. Democracy is a set of muscles and they work best when exercised throughout the body politic. Trials, turnout, journalism — it’s all important. Politics is a game of inches, so anything might make the difference.

All citizens need to think of what we can do to meet the moment, as my father and George H. W. Bush did during World War II and so many other brave men and women have done before us. Electing Kamala Harris would protect democracy but mark only the beginning of the revival of democratic values. With MAGA having metastasized, the battle against authoritarians at home and abroad will be, as JFK described the Cold War, a “long twilight struggle.”

In the early years of the New Deal, at the depths of a Depression much more painful and disruptive than anything we have experienced since, Franklin Roosevelt launched the National Recovery Administration. Shopkeepers and homeowners attached a decal to their windows featuring a blue eagle — the symbol of recovery — and a legend below that read: WE DO OUR PART.

Will we do ours?

Please buy from the bookseller of your choice, some of whom you can find at jonathanalter.com.

Here’s some of what’s being said about American Reckoning:

“I have been deeply indebted to Jonathan Alter for his political wisdom and journalistic experience these last 20 years, and I’m grateful for this gripping guidebook through a bizarre chapter in the life of our strangest president.”—Stephen Colbert

“No cameras in the courtroom, but Jonathan Alter’s brilliant book is the next best thing or better. Alter was the best writer there, and he delivers the historic drama as no one else could.”—Lawrence O’Donnell

“Jonathan Alter’s American Reckoning is a wonderful hybrid—a memoir of an extraordinary career in journalism, a political history of our recent past, and above all, an insightful account of Donald Trump’s criminal trial in New York. It’s also a cry for decency and democracy at a critical moment.”—Jeffrey Toobin, author of Homegrown: Timothy McVeigh and the Rise of Rightwing Extremism

“Because the trial wasn’t televised, the country couldn’t experience it. Alter’s lively account brings home the drama, the twists and turns, the moments of real accountability—with broader thoughts about his own life experience and essential constitutional values. First-rate.”—Harry Litman, former federal prosecutor

“A must-read for anyone who truly cares about the majesty of the rule of law during these perilous times.”—Retired New York Judge George Grasso

“I loved reading about Jonathan’s formative years and the powerhouse women who influenced him. Now I know why he’s such an original thinker! This is a great read.”—Susie Essman, actress on Curb Your Enthusiasm