Bestselling author and political strategist for have been what prompted you to tell your story . Because that people are always interested in the g story behind the story. Where did you come from . Was your father political . What was it like how do you say that stuff on tv how is it to work int the white house as a woman for President Trump . I answer that and i felt like somebody who has spoken millions of words in public. I felt people were speaking on behalf of me or at me or about me. Speaking so it is truly my term. Not just on the Trump White House it is not a tell all and foremost. And it isnd a very unique story about the circuitit circuitous path with all Italian Catholic women going all the way to the white house but in other ways it is an story and girls and women story because if you are willing to say yes and except no and if you put family first and waiting for Everything Else to unfold then if you get lucky as i did and great things can happen. So c between philadelphia and atlantic city. But your mother dayay and was very special. So when your mothers mother has helped you to say a couple of bad words but then she in and she admonished you. What is it like but then with your grandmother . Thankfully my mother is still with us. She lives with us and is a great presence in the life of my four children. She is ant forgotten woman and President Trump talked she was even forgotten by her husband left at the age of 26 no Child Support or alimony. And she figured it out. Wanted to be a stayathome mom i am an only child so wife happened. And say these four adult women and one child and then we turn the pyramid upside down. Its like one woman and four children now and so my mother in devoting her life to me gave me a great example. Of what it means to be committed to be loyal and to have faith family and freedom. I dont remember her ever having a political conversation that i can recall, but she voted it was her civic duty her constitutional right . She just missed the ability to vote for president. John f kennedy. She wasnt old enough just as i just missed voting for president Ronald Reagan, but i know that they were all inspired by this handsome young camelot catholic president. Tragically taken from us too young but there was my mother one day with my best friend michelle. I was visiting we were freshman in high school and it wasnt i said a few bad words. It was that i violated. One of the Ten Commandments is that i took gods name in vain. Yes, and she came around the corner with the gold crucifix off her neck and with a spoon the ladle and the pot of gravy as we call it tomato sauce to the rest of the world. What did you say and i said, i dont know. What did i say, dont you ever take gods name and then out of her mouth this wonderfully gentle woman with the gold crucifix shining out of my mothers mouth where f bombs and f bombs, you said dont you ever take gods name in me again . So it tells you an awful lot about i think in some ways how progressive the women who raised me were ironically they talked about abortion adultery. They talked about inflation. They talked about everything you can imagine except politics and because the matriarch of our extended family my grandmother and two in it lived in that house. That swing screen door had just a flotilla of constant traffic of people who knew if they had a problem or just needed a warm meal or an open ear they they can come there and do exactly that and so i grew up. I think that georges often told me that the world is like your focus group and i think it started right there around that wooden table and little atco new jersey where i would sit underneath and listen to adult conversation the gift of my professional life. For decades donna was going out literally around the country and listening to people night after night around larger wooden tables like this and focus groups and learning to appreciate the essential wisdom of americans and no they werent all just republicans or conservatives. I was talking to i was deeply interested in what everybody had to say this story what motivates in their stories, theyre frustrations their aspirations and you know, as well as i do. That the essential wisdom of americans is often lost on people in this town in washington dc and if we put them in charge of representing their their states their congressional districts, they would do a pretty solid job. They have thought this through again and again, and we should all be listening more to them. Echo was a small town. I think you lived off the highway, which i was interested in knowing a little bit more about so i had to google your town but as i got deep into the first couple of chapters about your childhood and growing up and and that environment i learned something that i didnt know about you that you pick blueberries, right . I packed blueberries in the packing shed you you packed and yes they pack them which meant that there are 12 planes in a crate and we would take out each pint put a piece of cellophane a forum to smash it down and then a rubber band and i was the fastest that i had ever been because we were told the fast you were the more you get paid but the pay was as follows. It was 16 cents a crate. So 16 cents for 12 pints packed and then by the time i left eight summers later don, it was 25 cents, but i made a few thousand dollars back in the day ages 12 to 19 packing blueberries, and that was legal. Then everybody calmed down. Its been outsourced now to machines do that work now, yes, but to grow up and literally have a summer job as a teenager where you have to show up and be ready to go by 8 am work until four or five pm an hour break for lunch with your friends and your family members to appreciate the value of teamwork punctuality a work ethic pride in your work that youre not just there for the money or there because youre making a difference for someone somehow i credit that Blueberry Farm for an early Early Education on what it means to be a hard worker that plus i grew up around Small Business owners my aunt and uncle had a roadside farm market 30 yards. To my house then it expanded into frozen italian Food Specialties because they would feed people who came to buy a buck a creative blueberries or a bucket of peaches. They say, what do i smell . Oh sit down have some brazil have some subways you just made fresh ravioli and people would encourage them. So thats america you said let me take my skill set. And expand that into a commercially profitable business, so i grew up around Small Business owners and entrepreneurs my mom took jobs. That allowed her to be with me in the mornings before school. Pick me up after school and and i just credit her for day after day showing me the value of of work of hard work and honest days wages for an honestys work and thats really the backbone of this country. Yes, but soon kellyanne would discover that there was life outside of southern, new jersey and you decided to come the washington dc to attend College Trinity college. Tell us about that experience and that drive down and and that first moment that that you arrived here. What what caught you what what made you decide the dc was to place to be so my parents did not go to college again. I think fairly typical for somebody maybe of my age and stage in that area and my mother drove me down here herself, and i know it was very hard for her to just leave for only child in washington dc in the storm. Im sure she cried the whole way home. Thank you, mommy for allowing me to spread my wings and do that. I really wanted to be in washington dc. I wanted to be a car ride away from home three hour car ride. I had been accepted at Boston College and it was the year after. Doug flutie won the Heisman Trophy and the applications were way up. We went to see Boston College lovely campus fabulous school, of course, but i really wanted to be in washington dc. I thought even early on i had this a little bit smitten and bitten by the political bug donna and i think a lot of that had to do with meeting Ronald Reagan very briefly, but you were just being in his company ferraro. Thats i wrote that i said, wait a minute you you were excited about Geraldine Ferraro until you met Ronald Reagan. I was indeed, so just to back up this a summer of 1984. Youll remember it. Well, yes, and its the republican and Democratic National conventions are going on now the democrats my party out of power. And i was so enthralled with geraldine for i thought well there she is just like the women who raised me in Italian Catholic woman. She was a congresswoman from queens walter mondell the democratic nominee tapped her and shes going to give her prime time speech and accept that nomination as the first woman ever on a Major Party Ticket and i listened to her and i thought she was a great messenger, but the message really didnt grip me the way president reagans message the next week at his convention with me. Peace through strength calling out communism. I think he just had a very joyful way of communicating free market capitalism of communicating why its important to invest in military strength why its important to going back to an honest days wage for an honestly you were attracted to this message or we were you attractive to the fact that you had a sense that he could lead his instincts. What was it . Oh, he was both of the above and indeed. There was a big sweep that election cycle. I mean, obviously he won every every state including geraldine. Ferrars new york. He went every state except walter mondales minnesota in the district of columbia, but i got to meet him because at that time republican president ial candidate seoul new jersey is competitive and they came and campaign and here is Ronald Reagan and hammonton, new jersey in september 1984. It was code captain of the Field Hockey Team is a senior and i had been blueberry princess, so i got to meet him. It was only a brief encounter, but you know how that goes and youre hooked, and i know you know that because you have you been the counselor the consultant for the advisor for so many strong leaders in your party, but across this country, and i know now you mentor so many young people and so youve seen on both sides and we have to remind ourselves that those chance encounters can be so incredibly important to people and it was to me but you grew up and before we get into candidates and theres so much in your book that ive learned about not just the Republican Party, but also some of the individuals that you consulted with i mean, it was a very well balanced book in terms of telling us about not just your journey, but also to journey of the Republican Party, so i want to go back to that moment you lived in an area of with democrats. Yes. Definitely. Were probably raised being catholic in new jersey with a lot of democrats. I was but in Ronald Reagan you saw Something Else a lot of other democrats so that but at the time you were not registered to vote right . I was not registered to vote i missed voting for Ronald Reagan by two and a half months. Thats right because youre born in january 20th, and thats right being able to vote for him. I was still 17 for his reelection. Youre absolutely right the first words in my entire book. Heres the deal donna, you know, by every imaginable metric. I should have been a democrat and liberal and a feminist and probably a man hater too. My father left the men in my life my uncles my cousins. They expanded family members all these great male role models in my life who stepped in and and stepped up for me. They pretty much were all members of the private trades carpenters and welders and iron workers plumbers and who you know graduated high school with their skill certificate and their High School Diploma went to work right away and have had those jobs for decades being able to support themselves and their families the most wonderful people so, you know, they tend toward the Democratic Party irish and Italian Catholics at that time. I think, you know not to over generalize. They absolutely had an affinity to the Democratic Party. Obviously john kennedy and it was the height of feminism. No fault divorce rover versus wade, so i talk about that and Ronald Reagan not on like many other people in my generation inspired me with a very optimistic i also felt he wasnt fall toward other people. He was very inclusive in his words and i grew up in a house where people came through that back during my aunt marie. God rest her soul for whom quality is named claudia marie. Shes my mothers oldest sister the only one to ever go to college and a big mentor. My life died suddenly at the age of 66 20 years ago, and its a huge loss for our family, but she packed so much life and i just told my kids, you know, heres a woman you never met always ready for the next adventure always off key singing and dancing with gusto the way you should with abandon, but she was very progressive. She was an eighth Grade Public School math teacher and she had run the Family Business and she got mad at the George Herbert walker Bush Campaign and him in 1992 for saying that and bill clinton was a draft dodger. She said in vietnam. She said well if that were my nephew, i would drive him to can i would help him get out of that. She i believe she was prochoice. She was you know, shes sort of a feminist icon in the way. She was very vocal. Yes, and and yet so i had every sign and she had you know, she would bring friends over of all backgrounds and all affiliations and you know looking back. We didnt know that people felt comfortable to be in my house and nobody felt the need to say and im this on that they just all felt comfortable and welcome. I love growing up that way because i tell young people now down at the very worried about not being able to speak up or not being able to say who they really are that goes for right left and center in many places and spaces. I tell them listen. Well god hath made no man, or woman can ever cancel you hold your head high and you be who you are and you be proud of that and you make sure that you let your light shine down ever let anybody dim or diminish your light. I learned that in that house. I didnt learn in any book or any any conversation your family had such a well they were role models, but more importantly they were your friends. I got to know your family by reading the way you guys would drive the three hours down the washington dc packed. It just reminded me of my family. Maybe its something catholic about us that you always have to, you know, make your own sandwiches and and bring you on food. Is that the people in the next town didnt cook as well and i love that. I say, my mother would have loved your your mother and your grandmothers, but i want to talk about you. Youre in washington dc. Youre clearly becoming more and more interested in politics of public service, but it wasnt until you went to law school and graduated that you really got into poland you met frank lance whos another friend of mine bill worth lynn neil you you got into the business, but i kept reading reading and reading and im like was all men someone to my own background that when i finally got to washington dc. I had paul tully. I had all of the guys but there were no women there. No women no women at the table. What was it like for you on the republican side being the only woman in the room, especially at that age just starting your career where you have a discourage that you ever just want to just walk stand up and walk out. I read in a book that you were very patient, but god knows im sure theres some there were some days that you just wanted to walk out. Theres no question about that and there were many days that the men in the room would have preferred i walk out of it. No, yeah there and thats why you cant if you know your skill set and you know who you are and that youve got something to add to the conversation and to the consideration to the analysis then you do that i learned early on that. I had some gifts and some insights that maybe others did not just because im a woman but because i was listening to women and there i was as an unmarried. Nonmother as many women are and choose to be in this country for many many years. I got married at 34. I had my first children at 37. I had charlotte and vanessa in my 40s. I say, oh there are no eggs left in your 40s. I said, well there were two rolling around in there the names of charlotte and vanessa, but thats really thats the growing percentage of women in this country too. The point is because i learned to listen to women specifically i was able to draw on that in these different conversations and tables that only included men and i started to do that and because so many those men in the old and particularly the new boys network. Were excluding me from being able to pitch certain business at the Republican National committee or in this company or that company it forced me to go and find work elsewhere. So i had major clients like Martha Stewart living on the media or Major League Baseball or American Express at the time major clients, and that allowed me to listen not just to what likely voters were saying but to what all of america was doing are you making your decisions of how you spend your time . How you spend your money . You show me what you do in a weekend. Are you going to a professional sporting event a kids sporting event . Are you as i was a woman w