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This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future
The “blockbuster” ( The Guardian ) New York Times bestseller, a shocking, definitive account of the 2020 election and the first year of the Biden presidency by two New York Times reporters, exposes the deep fissures within both parties as the country approaches a political breaking point.
This is the authoritative, “deeply reported” ( The Wall Street Journal ) account of an eighteen-month crisis in American democracy that will be seared into the country’s political memory for decades to come. With stunning, in-the-room detail, New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns show how both our political parties confronted a series of national traumas, including the coronavirus pandemic, the January 6 attack on the Capitol, and the political brinksmanship of President Biden’s first year in the White House.
From Donald Trump’s assault on the 2020 election and his ongoing campaign of vengeance against his fellow Republicans to the behind-the-scenes story of Biden’s selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate and his bitter struggles to unite the Democratic Party, this book exposes the degree to which the two-party system has been strained to the point of disintegration. More than at any time in recent history, the long-established traditions and institutions of American politics are under siege as a set of aging political leaders struggle to hold together the changing country.
Martin and Burns break news on most every page, drawing on hundreds of interviews and never-before-seen documents and recordings from the highest levels of government. This “masterful” (George Stephanopoulos) book asks the vitally important (and disturbing) can American democracy, as we know it, ever work again?
This is the authoritative, “deeply reported” ( The Wall Street Journal ) account of an eighteen-month crisis in American democracy that will be seared into the country’s political memory for decades to come. With stunning, in-the-room detail, New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns show how both our political parties confronted a series of national traumas, including the coronavirus pandemic, the January 6 attack on the Capitol, and the political brinksmanship of President Biden’s first year in the White House.
From Donald Trump’s assault on the 2020 election and his ongoing campaign of vengeance against his fellow Republicans to the behind-the-scenes story of Biden’s selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate and his bitter struggles to unite the Democratic Party, this book exposes the degree to which the two-party system has been strained to the point of disintegration. More than at any time in recent history, the long-established traditions and institutions of American politics are under siege as a set of aging political leaders struggle to hold together the changing country.
Martin and Burns break news on most every page, drawing on hundreds of interviews and never-before-seen documents and recordings from the highest levels of government. This “masterful” (George Stephanopoulos) book asks the vitally important (and disturbing) can American democracy, as we know it, ever work again?
- GenresPolitics
480 pages, Paperback
Published May 2, 2023
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43 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 29, 2024
Overall, this is a solid piece of what one might call journalistic historiography, which is part Trump post-mortem and part analysis of the burgeoning Biden administration (what some might now call a pre-post-mortem).
As I read this book, the main idea is centrist, moderate, bipartisanship and the fights in both parties to achieve it. Beneath that main idea is a subtext that resonates with me and, I assume, other politically homeless gen-Xers who are already predisposed to writing off bickering elites. That subtext is this: the condemnation of Trump loyalists in the Republican Party for driving extremism is legitimate, but consistency requires that one also acknowledge the tendency of progressives and self-styled socialists in the Democratic Party to do the same. For all the praise coming from the left side of the aisle for conservatives and Republicans willing to stand up to Trump and his supporters, there is also a severe lack of similar praise for centrist Democrats who are willing to do the same with respect to progressive extremists.
While this book does a good job of highlighting the fractures in the Democratic Party precisely along these lines, it is still muted when compared to the vocal and combative postures Republicans are encouraged to take in reference to Trump. I can only speak for myself, but I am just as inclined to reject Democrats who placate progressives who call for defunding the police and see white supremacy lurking on every street corner. Both parties have backed themselves into a corner where dealing with extremists is necessary to advance a partly-line agenda. The solution, of course, is to outright reject extremism on either side and come together at the center.
We aren't there yet, but I think books like this help the cause.
As I read this book, the main idea is centrist, moderate, bipartisanship and the fights in both parties to achieve it. Beneath that main idea is a subtext that resonates with me and, I assume, other politically homeless gen-Xers who are already predisposed to writing off bickering elites. That subtext is this: the condemnation of Trump loyalists in the Republican Party for driving extremism is legitimate, but consistency requires that one also acknowledge the tendency of progressives and self-styled socialists in the Democratic Party to do the same. For all the praise coming from the left side of the aisle for conservatives and Republicans willing to stand up to Trump and his supporters, there is also a severe lack of similar praise for centrist Democrats who are willing to do the same with respect to progressive extremists.
While this book does a good job of highlighting the fractures in the Democratic Party precisely along these lines, it is still muted when compared to the vocal and combative postures Republicans are encouraged to take in reference to Trump. I can only speak for myself, but I am just as inclined to reject Democrats who placate progressives who call for defunding the police and see white supremacy lurking on every street corner. Both parties have backed themselves into a corner where dealing with extremists is necessary to advance a partly-line agenda. The solution, of course, is to outright reject extremism on either side and come together at the center.
We aren't there yet, but I think books like this help the cause.
August 13, 2025
The book offers a great depiction of how and why the Republican party did not manage to wrestle away from Donald Trump in the aftermath of January 6th and his belief that the 2020 election was stolen, which spread throughout the country and Congress. If gives an understanding of which actors played central roles or lacked leadership in a time where leadership was needed the most. Meanwhile, the incoming Biden Administration was described without further diving into the horrific lack of fitness for a president which has later been uncovered after his presidency. No new groundbreaking details surfaced in the book which would have marked the last star of my review
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews