STERLING, Va. — Donald Trump’s Republican campaign for president is built on the same win-at-all-costs, no-second-guessing confidence that made him billions in real estate and a star of reality television.
Yet in a recent interview with The Associated Press, the GOP front-runner displayed rare, if fleeting, moments of humility and introspection.
“I think I could lose a state, sure,” Trump said of the first three states to vote in next year’s presidential primaries. “If I came in second or third, I think that would be, you know, I wouldn’t be happy, ’cause I want to win.”
In retrospect, Trump also said he might not have used the phrase “truthful hyperbole” in his 1987 book “The Art of the Deal.” The phrase has trailed Trump in the 2016 campaign, as have questions about whether his penchant for exaggeration and tenuous relationship with some facts would be appropriate for a president.
“I think maybe if I had that phrase to do over again, I’d use the word ‘optimistic,’ perhaps. I would want to be very optimistic,” Trump said.
Trump displayed his signature bravado throughout much of the 30-minute interview with The Associated Press at his golf course in northern Virginia. He declined to name a single thing he’s said over the course of the campaign that he wished he could take back. He repeatedly referenced his dominant standing in preference polls and the enthusiasm of his crowds.
But the glimmers of self-reflection and self-awareness stood out. They offered a look at a side rarely seen at Trump’s rallies and television appearances.
His political rise has set the party’s establishment on edge. Trump draws large and enthusiastic crowds to rallies and repeatedly says things viewed by some as offensive.
He also has developed a pattern of repeating falsehoods in speeches and interviews. Among them: There are 100 million unemployed workers in the United States, and President Barack Obama plans to allow 250,000 Syrian refugees into the country.
Trump outlined the concept of “truthful hyperbole” in “The Art of the Deal,” calling it “an innocent form of exaggeration — and very effective form of promotion.”
“People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular,” he wrote.
Asked whether he would take the same approach as president, Trump suggested he would, but would recast it as less about stretching the truth and more about putting a positive spin on the circumstances.
