# Post x_370200907834597377

- Post ID: `x_370200907834597377`
- Platform: X (Twitter)
- Posted: 2013-08-21T15:09:09.000Z (UTC)
- Deleted: no
- Repost: no
- Canonical URL: https://trump.fm/post/x_370200907834597377
- Analysis page: https://trump.fm/post/x_370200907834597377/analysis
- Audio narration: https://static.trump.fm/audio/x_370200907834597377.mp3 (a synthesized voice reading the post text, not a recording)

## Post text

> The hatchet job in @NYMag about Roger Ailes is total bullshit. He is the ultimate winner who is surrounded by a great team. @FoxNews

## Engagement

- Likes: 389
- Reposts: 495
- Replies: 0
- Views: unknown
- Metrics collected: 2026-01-31T23:43:13.283Z (UTC)

# Analysis

_Machine-generated by trump.fm on 2026-02-25T19:16:23.807Z (UTC): a model's reading of this post, not his words. Its psychological terms describe the language, not a clinical assessment of him._

## Summary

Trump's August 21, 2013 post defending Roger Ailes reveals, on investigation, a psychologically complex specimen of performative loyalty embedded within an intricate mutual leverage relationship. Gabriel Sherman's reporting confirmed Ailes had directly called Trump and requested the public defense — one element in a coordinated Fox News PR campaign where multiple hosts and staffers attacked Sherman simultaneously within two hours. The tweet was therefore orchestrated counter-narrative, not spontaneous outrage: "surrounded by a great team" precisely inverts Sherman's documented thesis that Ailes was "all alone" after firing Brian Lewis, suggesting Trump was briefed on the specific claim to rebut. Simultaneously, Sherman's 2016 reporting reveals Trump was acting as mediator in Ailes-Lewis severance negotiations at Trump Tower, allegedly gaining access to Lewis's arsenal of planned Fox News disclosures — the intelligence that would later allow Trump to "attack Fox News with impunity." The tweet sits at the intersection of performed loyalty and strategic accumulation: executing Ailes's requested favor while collecting leverage about his vulnerabilities. Stylistic markers (profanity, hyperbolic superlatives, emotional directness) confirm Trump likely composed the text himself — authentic voice, directed content. Primary defense mechanisms: splitting, idealization, rationalization. Winner/loser schema projected onto Ailes as narcissistic merger-by-proxy; antisocial features elevated by the simultaneous exploitation dynamic. No cognitive impairment markers; consistent with 2013 baseline. Danger: none. Historically notable as an early node in a longitudinal mutual-leverage arc culminating in Trump's 2016 ability to operate against Fox News from a position of accumulated intelligence.

## Analysis: Coordinated Loyalty Performance — Trump Defends Ailes (August 21, 2013)

### Timing & Location
UTC 15:09:09 → **11:09 AM EDT** (Trump Tower, New York City). August 2013 found Trump headquartered in Manhattan, actively running his real estate operations and preparing for *The Celebrity Apprentice*. Mid-morning timing is a mild aide indicator, but content and documented context override this signal substantially.

### Critical Revealed Context: Orchestrated Performance
The full psychological significance of this post emerges only from subsequent investigative reporting. HuffPost's August 22, 2013 article — citing Gabriel Sherman — confirmed that **Roger Ailes directly called Trump and asked him to publicly criticize Sherman's NYMag piece**. This was not spontaneous outrage. The tweet was one element in a coordinated Fox News defensive operation in which approximately eight hosts and staffers attacked Sherman within a two-hour window — a synchronized counter-narrative campaign.

The article being attacked appears to be Sherman's *"Roger Ailes Is Now All Alone"* — a piece arguing Ailes had become isolated following his July 25, 2013 firing of longstanding communications chief Brian Lewis, whom Ailes suspected of leaking to Sherman. Trump's defense — **"surrounded by a great team"** — directly inverts Sherman's "all alone" thesis with surgical precision, strongly suggesting Trump was briefed on the specific narrative point to rebut rather than composing independently.

A further dimension, confirmed by Gabriel Sherman's 2016 reporting (Salon, April 4, 2016), elevates the stakes: Ailes had involved Trump as a **mediator in the Ailes-Lewis severance negotiations held at Trump Tower**, where Trump — through his lawyer's prior relationship with Lewis's attorney — allegedly gained access to Lewis's planned arsenal of damaging Fox News disclosures. The tweet thus sits at the intersection of two simultaneous moves: executing Ailes's requested PR favor while accumulating strategic leverage over the very patron being defended. Sherman's 2016 observation that Trump could "attack Fox News with impunity" traces directly to this 2013 intelligence acquisition.

### Authorship Assessment
**Score: 0.78 — Likely authentic Trump voice, but third-category authorship applies: coordinated loyalty performance.**

The standard aide-written vs. authentic binary is insufficient here. Authentic markers are strong: (1) explicit profanity ("total bullshit") — communications staff almost never introduce profanity; (2) emotional directness and absence of hedging; (3) hyperbolic superlative ("ultimate winner") — a signature Trump verbal tic; (4) simple declarative structure consistent with Trump's 2013 baseline. Trump almost certainly composed the text himself.

However, the *motivation* was externally directed (Ailes's direct request), and the *counter-narrative* was demonstrably briefed. The "surrounded by a great team" refutation of Sherman's specific thesis suggests content coordination, not purely spontaneous emotional output. This is best classified as **authentic voice, directed content** — Trump deploying his genuine register in service of an orchestrated campaign.

Mid-morning (11 AM) timing is the primary aide indicator, overridden by content rawness. Confidence rated **medium** rather than high due to the orchestration dimension.

### Psychological Trigger & Dynamics
The surface trigger is an attack on a patron. The psychological architecture beneath is considerably more sophisticated. Trump executes Ailes's requested favor through the mechanism of supply-seeking (maintaining Fox News access, demonstrating platform value to Ailes) while simultaneously operating as a strategic intelligence collector. The relationship reveals Trump as both **instrument** (Ailes deploys him as a media asset) and **accumulator** (Trump converts the relationship into leverage).

**Narcissistic merger-by-proxy**: "The ultimate winner" is Trump's own self-schema projected onto Ailes. Allies are not praised on their own terms; they are assimilated into Trump's winner/loser identity architecture and praised by being categorized as *like Trump*. The irony is layered: Trump is applying "ultimate winner" to someone whose vulnerabilities he is simultaneously cataloging through the Lewis negotiations.

**Transactional calculation beneath performed loyalty**: The antisocial dimension requires elevation. Performing loyalty while accumulating leverage over the beneficiary of that loyalty reflects interpersonal exploitation in Kernberg's sense — even if subjectively experienced as rational self-interest rather than betrayal. The performance of authentic friendship conceals the simultaneous hedge.

### Defense Mechanisms
- **Splitting** (immature): Sharp binary — NYMag as corrupt "hatchet job"/"bullshit" (all-bad) vs. Ailes as "ultimate winner" surrounded by a "great team" (all-good). Zero nuance or middle ground acknowledged.
- **Idealization** (immature): Ailes rendered in superlatives; the Brian Lewis firing — the very event whose consequences Sherman documented — goes entirely unacknowledged.
- **Rationalization** (neurotic): "Total bullshit" forecloses the need to engage Sherman's specific claims through categorical source-discrediting, creating the appearance of having rebutted without doing so.

### Rhetorical Techniques
- **Ad hominem / source discrediting**: "Hatchet job" impugns motive rather than accuracy — the lowest-cost refutation because it requires no engagement with substance.
- **Profanity as epistemic dismissal**: "Total bullshit" performs unfiltered certainty; its rawness signals conviction without requiring evidence.
- **Counter-narrative precision**: "Surrounded by a great team" surgically inverts Sherman's "all alone" thesis, suggesting briefed coordination.
- **Strategic dual-audience tagging**: @NYMag (public confrontation) + @FoxNews (loyalty signal to patron, audience alignment with Fox consumers).
- **Coordinated RAND Firehose element**: This tweet is one unit in a multi-actor, high-volume assault on Sherman's credibility within a narrow time window — consistent with volume-based reality overwhelming.

### Cognitive Status
Simple, direct, coherent. No markers of impairment. Consistent with Trump's established 2013 Twitter baseline: limited vocabulary, short declarative sentences, intact topic-coherence. Serves as a useful early **anchor data point** for longitudinal cognitive analysis.

### Gaslighting & Reality Distortion
Mild but instructive: Presenting orchestrated counter-narrative performance as spontaneous emotional defense; blanket dismissal of journalism as "total bullshit" without addressing specific claims; "surrounded by a great team" as fabricated reality directly contradicting documented circumstances (Lewis's firing having created the very isolation Sherman reported).

### Danger Assessment
No significant danger indicators. The post attacks media credibility and participates in a coordinated journalistic intimidation campaign with some chilling-effect dimensions, but no dehumanization, eliminationist language, or stochastic terrorism markers are present.

### Historical Arc
Roger Ailes resigned from Fox News in July 2016 following multiple documented, settled sexual harassment allegations. Trump defended him then as well, in a direct longitudinal repetition of this 2013 dynamic. The 2013 Lewis negotiations allegedly gave Trump access to information that would make his 2016 "attack Fox News with impunity" posture possible. This tweet is therefore not merely a data point in media loyalty — it is an early node in a multi-year arc of mutual leverage, strategic intelligence accumulation, and selective performance of alliance.

## Fact Verification

| Claim | Verdict | Evidence |
|-------|---------|----------|
| "There was a hatchet job in New York Magazine about Roger Ailes" | **Half True** | Gabriel Sherman published investigative reporting on Roger Ailes in New York Magazine in August 2013 ('Roger Ailes Is Now All Alone'), documenting Ailes's isolation following Brian Lewis's firing. The article's existence and factual basis are confirmed; Sherman's reporting was subsequently validated in major respects, including by the $8 million settlement Fox paid Lewis and Ailes's 2016 resignation amid documented sexual harassment. 'Hatchet job' is Trump's characterization of intent, not a verifiable claim about the article's accuracy. |
| "Roger Ailes is the ultimate winner surrounded by a great team" | **Mostly False** | Factually inverts the documented circumstances: Sherman's piece argued Ailes was isolated precisely because he had fired Brian Lewis, his closest advisor, amid suspicions of disloyalty. Fox subsequently paid Lewis approximately $8 million in settlement. Ailes resigned from Fox News in July 2016 amid multiple documented, settled sexual harassment allegations. The 'great team' and 'ultimate winner' claims are directly contradicted by the circumstances that prompted the article and by subsequent events. |
| "The tweet represents Trump's spontaneous reaction to the article" | **False** | Gabriel Sherman's reporting (corroborated by HuffPost, August 22, 2013) states Ailes directly called Trump and requested the public defense. The tweet was part of a coordinated Fox News response involving ~8 hosts and staffers attacking Sherman within a two-hour window. The counter-narrative precision ('surrounded by a great team' inverting Sherman's 'all alone' thesis) further supports briefed coordination rather than spontaneous composition. |

Overall Veracity: 23%

## Authorship Analysis

**Self-Written** (score: 78%)

### Indicators

- Explicit profanity ('total bullshit') — communications staff almost never introduce profanity in official posts
- Absence of hedging, qualification, or diplomatic softening
- Emotionally direct register consistent with documented Trump Twitter style from this period
- Hyperbolic superlative ('ultimate winner') — signature Trump praise vocabulary
- Simple declarative sentence structure consistent with 2013 Trump baseline

## Psychological Profile

### State

**Grandiose State**

**Trigger:** Supply Seeking (Ailes's direct request following NYMag publication of Gabriel Sherman's 'Roger Ailes Is Now All Alone' piece; Trump executing requested loyalty performance as part of coordinated Fox News PR campaign)

**Rage:** Intensity 35% targeting New York Magazine / Gabriel Sherman
- Proportionality: 40%

Sentiment: -0.25

### Clinical

**Malignant Narcissism:**
- Narcissistic: 55%
- Antisocial: 45%
- Paranoid: 25%
- Sadism: 10%

**Defense Mechanisms:**
- splitting (immature)
- idealization (immature)
- rationalization (neurotic)

**Cognitive Complexity:**
- Complexity: 100%

**Parasocial Techniques:**
- Profanity as authenticity signal: performing the 'unfiltered real Trump' to create parasocial intimacy with followers
- Public loyalty display: presents as a man who defends allies openly, building follower identification and trust
- In-group bonding through shared enemy: proto-fake-news framing uniting conservative Fox audience against 'biased' mainstream media

## Danger Assessment

**NONE**

### Gaslighting

- 'Total bullshit' blanket dismissal delegitimizes documented journalism without engaging any specific factual claim
- Post presents as spontaneous emotional outrage when reportedly a coordinated, Ailes-requested PR performance — the performed authenticity is itself a form of deception
- 'Surrounded by a great team' fabricates a reality directly inverting Sherman's documented finding that Ailes was isolated following Lewis's firing

## Fact Checks (3)

_The model's verdicts from 2026-02-25._

> There was a hatchet job in New York Magazine about Roger Ailes

**HALF TRUE**

Gabriel Sherman published investigative reporting on Roger Ailes in New York Magazine in August 2013 ('Roger Ailes Is Now All Alone'), documenting Ailes's isolation following Brian Lewis's firing. The article's existence and factual basis are confirmed; Sherman's reporting was subsequently validated in major respects, including by the $8 million settlement Fox paid Lewis and Ailes's 2016 resignation amid documented sexual harassment. 'Hatchet job' is Trump's characterization of intent, not a verifiable claim about the article's accuracy.

Sources: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/roger-ailes-brian-lewis-gabriel-sherman_n_3795376; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Sherman; https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/politics-news/fox-news-pays-ousted-executive-664346/

> Roger Ailes is the ultimate winner surrounded by a great team

**MOSTLY FALSE**

Factually inverts the documented circumstances: Sherman's piece argued Ailes was isolated precisely because he had fired Brian Lewis, his closest advisor, amid suspicions of disloyalty. Fox subsequently paid Lewis approximately $8 million in settlement. Ailes resigned from Fox News in July 2016 amid multiple documented, settled sexual harassment allegations. The 'great team' and 'ultimate winner' claims are directly contradicted by the circumstances that prompted the article and by subsequent events.

Sources: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/brian-lewis-fox-news-fired_n_3787617; https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/politics-news/fox-news-pays-ousted-executive-664346/; https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/brian-lewis-breaks-silence-as-611392/

> The tweet represents Trump's spontaneous reaction to the article

**FALSE**

Gabriel Sherman's reporting (corroborated by HuffPost, August 22, 2013) states Ailes directly called Trump and requested the public defense. The tweet was part of a coordinated Fox News response involving ~8 hosts and staffers attacking Sherman within a two-hour window. The counter-narrative precision ('surrounded by a great team' inverting Sherman's 'all alone' thesis) further supports briefed coordination rather than spontaneous composition.

Sources: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/roger-ailes-brian-lewis-gabriel-sherman_n_3795376; https://www.salon.com/2016/04/04/why_roger_ailes_is_terrified_of_donald_trump_it_might_be_blackmail_not_bias_that_has_fox_news_gushing_over_the_billionaire/

Overall Veracity: 23%

## Tags

- fox-news (95%)
- roger-ailes (95%)
- gabriel-sherman (75%)
- media-delegitimization (85%)
- coordinated-counter-narrative (90%)
- transactional-loyalty (90%)
- splitting (75%)
- winner-loser-schema (85%)
- strategic-leverage-accumulation (85%)
- mutual-exploitation (75%)
- narcissistic-merger-by-proxy (80%)
- profanity-as-authenticity-signal (65%)

## That day

_From trump.fm's machine-generated digest of the day, not his words._

**Nine Tweets, One Journalist: Trump's All-Day Gumbel Obsession Anchors a Racially Charged Posting Marathon**

Trump spent the day locked onto a personal grudge against journalist Bryant Gumbel, attacking him across nearly a dozen posts as a "racist," "dope," and failure -- likely triggered by Gumbel's criticism of Trump's Scottish golf operations. The other major thread was a full-throated defense of New York's Stop and Frisk policing program, recently ruled unconstitutional, paired with pointed comparisons between the Chris Lane murder and the Trayvon Martin case. Between feuds, he promoted a Fox News appearance, defended Roger Ailes against a magazine profile, taunted Scotland's First Minister over wind turbines, and retweeted flattering fans. The mood was overwhelmingly combative and self-assured, with the sheer volume of Gumbel posts standing out as the day's most striking feature.

Full digest for 2013-08-21: https://trump.fm/date/2013-08-21/analysis

## Citation

- APA: Trump, D. J. (2013, August 21). The hatchet job in @NYMag about Roger Ailes is... [Social media post]. X (Twitter). trump.fm. https://trump.fm/post/x_370200907834597377
- MLA: Trump, Donald J. "The hatchet job in @NYMag about Roger Ailes is total..." X (Twitter), 21 Aug. 2013. trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_370200907834597377. Accessed 9 Oct. 2026.
- Chicago: Donald J. Trump, "The hatchet job in @NYMag about Roger Ailes is total...," X (Twitter), August 21, 2013, archived at trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_370200907834597377.

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