Trump’s 2020 campaign comms director Tim Murtaugh says he thought BLOOD was dripping down Rudy Giuliani’s face at infamous press conference and reveals which aide demanded Biden be checked for an earpiece at a debate

Tim Murtaugh, the communications director of the Trump 2020 campaign, writes in a new memoir that it is now Rep. Max Miller was the one to demand that President Joe Biden be inspected for an earpiece ahead of the first presidential debate.

He also writes, Swing hard in case it hits you: My escape from addiction and shot at redemption during the Trump campaignthat he thought “blood” was dripping down Rudy Giuliani’s face during that infamous Republican National Committee press conference.

Murtaugh details some of the wild turns the 2020 campaign took in the book, which was released Tuesday, but every other chapter flashes back to his harrowing battle with alcoholism.

He came clean in May 2015 after driving under the influence twice, serving several short prison sentences and after being charged — and threatened with 80 days in jail — for public intoxication after a day of drinking at Chili’s.

During his recovery, he was able to get his life back on track and landed one of the top jobs in presidential politics during the 2020 cycle.

“This isn’t tell-all like other books from the Trump era,” he told DailyMail.com. “Working for President Trump’s re-election campaign remains the highest honor of my professional career and I will support him again in 2024.”

Murtaugh writes about several light-hearted moments from the campaign, including when Miller, who had joined the campaign from the White House, surprised campaign staff by revealing that he had asked members of the Commission on Presidential Debates to have Biden inspected for an earpiece.

The author explained how the Trump campaign and members of the CPD went back and forth in negotiations over how the three planned presidential debates would work.

Murtaugh recalled that just days before the first debate, which was held in Cleveland, Ohio, on September 29, Miller briefed Trump campaign staffers on how the negotiations were going.

“He went through a list of different things that he had demanded, and that the Biden campaign had asked for, and the things that both parties agreed to. In the end, he only had one item left,” Murtaugh wrote.

Quoting Miller, he continued, “So as we were wrapping up, I told them, ‘Oh yeah, we want to do an earphone check too.’

“There was a moment of silence in the room,” Murtaugh recalled. ”What?’ Someone said.’

Miller then repeated, “An earphone check.”

“I told them we wanted both candidates to take an exam right before they take the stage to make sure they’re not wearing earphones,” Miller, now a congressman representing a district in Ohio, explained .

Someone in the room laughed, “Jesus Christ, Max!”

Murtaugh said he was “confident that the Biden camp had agreed to the ear check.”

“(S)o on the morning of the debate, we accused Biden’s team of pulling out of the deal,” he told Bloomberg News at the time: “Joe Biden’s handlers agreed to a pre-debate inspection several days ago for electronic earbuds, but today he abruptly changed and refused.’

The Biden team viewed the issue as a “distraction,” despite fact-checkers had to leave afterwards and saying the Democrat wasn’t wearing an earpiece when a number of people on social media suggested there was “evidence” he was.

More broadly, the Trump team sought to emphasize that Biden, now 81, was not mentally ready for the job.

They had asked for a fourth debate to be scheduled earlier in the campaign cycle as many states have implemented mail-in voting due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic — with voting beginning in late September in some states.

“Yes, we wanted more debates, and we wanted them sooner, because we believed most Americans were unaware of the extent to which Biden had deteriorated mentally and physically since seeing him as vice president,” Murtaugh wrote.

“Because he had the luxury of staying off the campaign trail due to COVID-19, he was able to remain largely hidden — but in a debate there would be no place to hide,” he continued.

However, Biden persevered – and managed to win the 2020 race.

On Election Day, those within the Trump campaign believed the election was winnable.

“If I had to guess,” a political operative told Murtaugh on Election Day. “I’d say we’ll win in no time.”

There were elections for Biden on Saturday, with Pennsylvania sliding back into the Democratic column.

But efforts were already underway to challenge the results.

In the book, Murtaugh expressed skepticism about some of these efforts, especially those of campaign attorney and former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani.

Murtaugh recalled telling Trump spokesman Jason Miller that he planned to skip Giuliani’s news conference at the RNC headquarters in Washington, D.C., where throngs of reporters were packed into a small room. He told the Trump official he would watch it on TV instead.

“And I watched it on TV, I did, and I was stunned to see dark streams of liquid running down Rudy Giuliani’s face on the screen,” Murtaugh wrote. ‘I remember moving closer to the television to see if I could figure out what it was, at first I thought it was blood.’

He noted that it was “widely speculated” afterward that it was Giuliani’s hair dye that leaked down the sides of his face into the warm room.

“The press conference immediately took on legendary status, and there was general agreement among the dwindling campaign staff that nothing else could happen that would surprise us,” Murtaugh wrote.

The RNC presser took place on November 19, a month and a half before January 6.

Murtaugh also recalled that campaign officials, including campaign manager Bill Stepien, left a meeting chaired by Giuliani when election fraud theories became crazy.

“Giuliani talked about voting machines and fraud, the details of which I don’t remember today, although I remember thinking I couldn’t defend it all on television if called upon to do so,” the communications director recalled. .

Murtaugh noted that Giuliani claimed at a public hearing in Pennsylvania that only 1.82 million absentee ballots had been requested, yet 2.5 million votes had been cast.

‘I decided to do a little digging myself by looking at the same website. What I discovered was shocking and maddening at the same time,” Murtaugh said.

Giuliani had seen how many mail-in ballots had been requested for the state’s primary (1.82 million) and how many had been cast in Pennsylvania’s general election (2.5 million).

“It was clear that these were two separate and distinct elections — one primary and one general — and those two numbers were completely irrelevant to each other,” a frustrated Murtaugh said.

Now that he has been sober for almost nine years, Murtaugh closes the book by saying that he hopes his story can serve as an inspiration to alcoholics.

“And finally, I hope that if fellow drunks read this, they can connect with it in some way and maybe hold off on grabbing a bottle for a few more minutes while they read it,” he wrote. “I know that in recovery I’m always one drink away from reliving a disaster, and the thought that my experience could help someone else helps keep me sober.”