"Survival Isn’t Surrender"

Understanding Trump’s pressure politics means recognizing a brutal truth: sometimes protecting students, research, and national security requires strategy; not performative resistance.

I have said this before, and I will say it again: I understand Donald Trump’s playbook better than anyone because I helped draft it, I defended it, and for years I executed it.

That’s not a badge of honor. It’s a confession.

Recently, I was invited by Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Dean of the Yale School of Management, to speak with more than 120 presidents from America’s leading universities. Jeffrey’s forthcoming book, Trump’s Ten Commandments, dissects the tactics, instincts, and pressure campaigns that define Trump’s operating system. He wanted me to do something few in academia are comfortable doing: translate Trump from spectacle into strategy.

They asked me a simple question: How do we deal with him when federal funding is threatened?

My answer shocked some of them.

Settle. And settle early.

Not because he’s right. Not because the demands are just. But because I know how this man thinks; and more importantly, how the people around him act when he smells resistance.

You think this is about ideology? It’s not. It’s about dominance.

Take what is happening at the Pentagon under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. In a sweeping memo, the Department of Defense is preparing to sever relationships with institutions like Harvard University and evaluate dozens of elite schools for alleged “bias” against the military or “adversary involvement.” The list of “moderate to high risk” schools reportedly includes Yale University, Princeton University, Columbia University, Stanford University, and Johns Hopkins University.

Let that sink in.

This isn’t trimming waste. This isn’t reform. This is leverage.

Graduate-level fellowships, law programs, medical training, nuclear engineering; programs that shape the intellectual backbone of our armed forces, are suddenly “at risk.” Officers who have already been accepted don’t know whether tuition assistance will disappear. Partnerships like the Space Force collaboration with Johns Hopkins now hang in limbo.

And who pays the price?

Not Trump. Not Hegseth. Not the political appointees—many of whom proudly hold degrees from the very Ivy League institutions now under attack.

The price is paid by service members. By the young Army lawyer planning to attend an ABA-accredited law school. By the Navy officer pursuing a medical degree under the Armed Forces Health Professions Scholarship Program. By the career NCO who signed years of their life away in exchange for the opportunity to study, grow, and sharpen their mind.

And by the students and researchers at these universities whose grants fund childhood cancer trials, medical breakthroughs, and defense innovation.

You see, when Trump threatens funding, he understands something instinctively: institutions are not built to withstand sustained federal financial warfare. Universities, like corporations, have boards. They have budgets. They have stakeholders who panic when numbers turn red.

Trump’s strategy is simple. Create maximum uncertainty. Apply public humiliation. Escalate the demand. Force a binary choice: surrender or suffer.

I watched him do this to contractors, to media companies, to political opponents. The initial ask is never the point. The spectacle of submission is.

And if you fight? He doubles down. And then, doubles down again.

The most dangerous misconception about Trump is that he will eventually compromise in good faith. He won’t. If he senses weakness, he exploits it. If he senses defiance, he punishes it.

That is why I told those university presidents to settle early; not out of cowardice, but out of realism. Because when you engage in a prolonged public war with this administration, you are not the only combatant. Your students become hostages. Your faculty become collateral damage. Your research becomes a bargaining chip.

Oh, I know the critics. The professional outrage artists. The keyboard commandos who couldn’t find the West Wing on a guided tour but somehow claim insider knowledge of Trump’s psyche. My DMs are flooded daily with screenshots of their nonsense—innuendo dressed up as insight, rage bait masquerading as analysis. “Michael just wants institutions to bow to Trump. He’s back serving his old master.” Please. That’s not commentary; that’s cosplay. These are people who built a brand on being perpetually offended and chronically uninformed. They weren’t in the room. They didn’t take the calls. They didn’t watch how the pressure campaigns unfold behind closed doors. They traffic in vibes and venom, not facts. And the irony? The loudest voices are usually the ones who have never negotiated anything more complex than a Twitter argument. I don’t want institutions to bow. I want them to survive. There’s a difference; but that would require understanding strategy instead of screaming slogans.

Trump doesn’t measure victory in policy outcomes. He measures it in optics. Give him the headline. Give him the press release. Let him declare triumph over “elite bias.” Then protect your students quietly. Preserve your funding streams. Shield the work that actually matters. Survive 3 more years.

Because once he locks onto you as an enemy, the machinery moves fast; and it is ruthless.

I spent years inside that machinery. I know how the calls are made. I know how allies are mobilized to amplify pressure. I know how agencies are instructed to “review” and “evaluate” until paralysis sets in.

This moment is bigger than Harvard or Yale. It is about whether we allow education; military or civilian, to be reshaped by grievance politics. It is about whether we understand that in Trump’s world, conflict is not an accident. It is the product.

I am not speculating. I am warning.

Dismiss me if it makes you feel righteous; but ignore this playbook, and you’ll hand him exactly what he’s counting on.

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IGNORE THEIR NOISE, LIES AND HATRED AND LET’S KEEP GROWING.

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Yeah, I know; you’re tired. This shit is exhausting.

Guess what? Me too.

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Because if you’re still reading this, you already get it:
This isn’t just a newsletter. It’s a rally cry. A war drum. A line in the sand.

We are not passive observers of the downfall. We are the resistance. We call out the liars. We drag corruption by the collar into the sunlight. We say the quiet parts out loud; and we don’t flinch.

But here’s the truth: I can’t do this solo. Not anymore.

The storm is already here. We are standing in it. And it’s wearing stars and stripes like camouflage, preaching “freedom” while it sells fascism at retail.

So let me ask you:
Are. You. In?

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We need to be louder than spin, tougher than propaganda, and impossible to gaslight.
That takes more than clicks. More than likes.
It takes skin in the game.

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But let’s be clear:

This isn’t about a book.
It’s about backbone.
It’s about calling out the gaslighters and refusing to be played.
It’s about locking arms and saying, “Not. On. Our. Watch.”

You want to make a difference?

Then make it; right now.

Because if we don’t fight for truth, no one will.
But if we fight together?

They can’t drown us out.

Let’s be so loud, they wish we were just angry tweets.
Let’s be unshakable.
Unignorable.
Un-fucking-breakable.

Let’s go!