Stephen King has called Donald Trump’s presidency “a horror story” – and suggested an ideal ending.
The prolific author is considered an expert on the genre, having written hugely successful novels including Carrie (1974), The Shining (1977), and It (1986). All three titles are among the several King books to have been adapted for the screen.
Asked in a new reader interview in The Guardian what he would write if he had to invent an ending for Trumpian America, King, 77, replied: “I think it would be impeachment – which, in my view, would be a good ending. I would love to see him retired, let’s put it that way. The bad ending would be that he gets a third term and takes things over completely.”
He added: “It’s a horror story either way. Trump is a horror story, isn’t he?”
Trump has been impeached twice by the House of Representatives, but acquitted by the Senate on both occasions. The first time was in 2019, for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, and the second came in 2021 after the January 6 Capitol attack, for which the House charged Trump with incitement of insurrection.
King’s words arrive in the same week that Trump put the National Guard on the streets of Washington DC as part of his promise to make the capital the safest city in the world.
Democrats have lambasted the US president, rejecting his insistence that street crime is “out of control” given that data for the past two years shows a steep decline.
DC Mayor Muriel Bowser decried Trump’s measures as an “authoritarian push” and urged the local community to “jump in” to “protect our home rule”.
Elsewhere in the same interview, King admitted that he finds book signings “tough”, explaining that he sometimes likes to sneak into bookshops to sign copies of his novels when no one is looking.
“I last did it at a bookstore down the road from me in western Maine and signed some copies of Never Flinch and You Like It Darker,” he said.
“I don’t really like book signings because you can’t do everybody,” King explained. “On my last book tour, I had to sign 400 books that were sifted at random from 1,000, so you only had a chance of getting one.
“But it was better than facing a line of people that never ends, where they all have two or three books. That’s tough.”
Published in 2020, If It Bleeds is King’s next novel to make it to the big screen. Starring Tom Hiddleston and Chiwetel Ejiofor, The Life of Chuck is out in cinemas on 20 August.