Trump’s Spent Years Being a Total Dick to Rudy

Former New York City Mayor and frothy-mouthed cable news fuck-up Rudy Giuliani is arguably President Donald Trump’s most vigorous public defender, spending what seems like his every waking moment spewing unhinged conspiracy theories about the deep state and George Soros and defending the president from the threat of impeachment.

Given all that, you’d think Trump would appreciate having a rabid lap dog like Rudy on his team. But according to the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, Trump’s relationship with Giuliani is marked not so much with the warmth you’d expect between two elderly racists, but with the president being a raging asshole to his faithful sycophant. Per the Journal:

Mr. Giuliani has known the president for decades, but bolstered his standing with Mr. Trump with his loyal support of his campaign in 2016. Mr. Trump didn’t always return the favor. He often needled the former mayor for falling asleep on long flights, and joked about whether Mr. Giuliani was looking at cartoons on his iPad, a former aide said.

OK, that’s not too bad, I guess? Dick behavior, to be sure, but not entirely soul-crushing. (Although I’m definitely curious what sort of ‘toons Rudy spends his time browsing.) But it gets worse.

During Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin’s 2017 wedding reception, the president “berated” Rudy in front of others for spitting while he talked and ordered him to stand somewhere else, a former aide told the paper.

Even when Rudy is doing his damndest to put a positive spin on Trump’s abhorrent behavior, the president apparently can’t help but be a huge jerk. According to former campaign aides Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie, Trump was still not pleased with Giuliani, even after he appeared on give different Sunday talk shows to defend the then-candidate in the wake of Access Hollywood’s “grab ‘em by the pussy” tape.

“Man, Rudy, you sucked,” Trump said, according to a book by Lewandowski and Bossie and cited by the Journal. “You were weak. Low energy.”

Now that Democrats have officially launched an impeachment inquiry into Trump—and Rudy’s—efforts to manipulate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into interfering in the 2020 elections, I can’t help but wonder if it’s only a matter of time before Trump really tells Giuliani what he thinks of him.