Inside Trump Tower, an Increasingly Upset and Alone Donald Trump





It has been his pride and his palace, a soaring black skyscraper overlooking Manhattan that seemed to match Donald J. Trump’s ambition and ostentatiousness.

But Trump Tower, since Friday afternoon, has become a kind of lonely fortress for its most famous occupant, who holes up inside, increasingly isolated and upset, denounced almost every hour by another Republican official.

Mr. Trump was asked to stay away from a party gathering Saturday afternoon in Wisconsin, where Speaker Paul D. Ryan and other state luminaries took the stage, a striking rebuke that left the Republican nominee for president with no place to go on a Saturday 31 days before the election.

So he remained inside his enormous penthouse apartment on the 66th floor, and his corporate suite 40 stories below, for almost all of Friday and Saturday.

At times he was joined by his small circle of loyalists, who arrived to prepare him for Sunday night’s debate against Hillary Clinton but instead spent much of the time trying to figure out how to undo the damage wrought by the surfacing of an 11-year-old video recording on which he can be heard gleefully describing pushing himself on women and sexually assaulting them.

At other times, Mr. Trump retreated to Twitter, where he retweeted posts from an account that says it belongs to a woman who had long ago accused Bill Clinton of rape.

Mr. Trump called a few reporters but lacked his usual gusto.

And he kept returning to watching coverage on CNN, the cable outlet he derides as biased against him but still tunes in to most often, and becoming more upset as he saw Republican officials condemn him one by one.

Mr. Trump has been rattled by the release of the 2005 video recording, according to two people with direct knowledge of his mood who were granted anonymity to candidly describe the situation.

He was urged to be humble, and he felt that he had been, in an apology video that his campaign released early Saturday. But he was criticized for ending his statement with a dig at the Clintons and for not apologizing to his wife, Melania, in his remarks. To him, the criticism was an affirmation that “nothing he can say or do” would reduce the hostility directed his way, according to one of the people with knowledge of how he feels.

Inside the tower on Saturday, different plans of action were discussed. Mr. Trump and his advisers considered a joint television interview that he and Ms. Trump would give to a major network, an echo of the 1992 appearance by the Clintons on “60 Minutes” after Gennifer Flowers claimed that she had had an affair with Mr. Clinton.

The deliberations over a possible interview were moving ahead despite Ms. Trump’s lack of interest in appearing on camera. But then Nancy O’Dell, the former “Access Hollywood” host whom Mr. Trump had lewdly described in the recording, issued a statement denouncing his comments. And then more tapes of Mr. Trump speaking crudely about women, this time on “The Howard Stern Show,” turned up on television.

The discussions about the interview were quickly dropped.

Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, an observant Jew who normally does not work on the Sabbath, was among those who gathered with him on Saturday, although the candidate’s oldest daughter, Ivanka, was not. Mr. Trump’s oldest son, Donald Jr., was there. Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey and Rudolph W. Giuliani also showed up, as did the Republican National Committee chairman, Reince Priebus.

Mr. Christie and Mr. Priebus told Mr. Trump that the situation with other Republicans was becoming dire. Other advisers assured Mr. Trump that attacking Mrs. Clinton over her husband’s behavior with women, and over reports that she had defended his behavior, would help rally Republicans again.

Ms. Trump and the rest of the Trump family made plans to travel with the candidate to the debate, in part to buoy his spirits.

But the real source of comfort to Mr. Trump seemed to be the small band of supporters waving Trump signs on the Fifth Avenue sidewalk outside the building. His fans clashed with people walking by, including a woman who told a female Trump supporter that she should go back to her “trailer.”

Mr. Trump could not resist the scene. Just before 5 p.m., he descended from what his aides grandly call “the residence” and strode through the marbled lobby, with his son and his campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, in tow.

He slipped through the glass front door, startling some of his star-struck supporters.

The crowd screamed and reached out to touch his suit jacket. He bathed in the rapturous admiration.

He pumped his right fist in the air and smiled. He looked rejuvenated.

He stayed for just five minutes, electrifying the scene.

But before he departed, one reporter screamed a question at him, asking whether he would remain in the race. “Hundred percent,” Mr. Trump replied.

He turned and headed back to the tower, clapping his hands as if to applaud his supporters, and himself.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/10/us/politics/trump-tower.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fus&action=click&contentCollection=us&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront