The ghostwriter credited with writing Donald Trump’s Art of the Deal was served with a cease-and-desist letter by a lawyer for Donald Trump after the author criticized the presumptive Republican nominee for President.
“It’s nuts and completely indicative of who he is,” Journalist Tony Schwartz said, confirming the cease-and-desist letter Wednesday on an interview with MSNBC . “There’s no basis of anything legal.”
The cease-and-desist letter from Trump’s lawyer Jason D. Greenblatt asked that Schwartz pay back “a certified check made payable to Mr. Trump,” according to a New York Times report.
Schwartz had previously told the New Yorker that he wrote all of Art of the Deal despite claims to the contrary by Trump. Schwartz said the Trump of 2016 was evident even when he worked on the book in the 1980s. During the writing process, Trump could not stay focused, often exaggerated the truth and boasted about his own accomplishments, said Schwartz. The book would be better titled “the sociopath,” Schwartz told the New Yorker.
“I genuinely believe that if Trump wins and gets the nuclear codes there is an excellent possibility it will lead to the end of civilization,” he said.
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Write to Justin Worland at justin.worland@time.com