Barbara Bush kept a special clock that counted down days left in Donald Trump's term as president
The late First Lady Barbara Bush reportedly hated President Donald Trump to such an extent that she kept a "countdown clock" in her bedroom, ticking off the seconds until he would leave office.
The former first lady died in April 2018 at the age of 92, and her husband former President George HW Bush passed away seven months later.
She reportedly blamed Trump for a flare-up of her congenital heart condition, which she thought at the moment was a heart attack. The revelations were based on excerpts from the upcoming book by Sussan Page, a USA Today reporter.
The former first lady was reportedly so perturbed by the brand of Republicanism the current president brought that she had a difficult time identifying with the GOP. When she was asked last year whether she still considered herself a Republican, she replied with: "I'd probably say no today."
Barbara Bush could reportedly not bring herself to vote either for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton during the 2016 elections so she wrote in her son Jeb's name instead, according to reports.
When the former first lady died, the Trump countdown clock was by her bedside.
Page, in her book 'The Matriarch', writes: "After Trump was elected, a friend in Kennebunkport gave her a Trump countdown clock as a joke. The red, white, and blue digital clock displayed how many days, hours, minutes and seconds remained in Trump’s term."
"She liked the countdown clock so much that when the Bushes returned to Houston that October, she brought it with her. It sat on her bedside table, where she could see it every day. It was there to the day she died," the book, which is slated to be go sale on April 2, noted.
The former first lady, however, was hopeful that the US would survive what she saw as a painfully disruptive episode which turned the presidency on its ear. "I'm trying not to think about it... We're a strong country, and I think it will all work out," she had reportedly said almost a year after President Trump took office.
The author recalled a pronouncement made by the late first lady during Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, where she said that he was endorsed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and that was the kind of endorsement no one wanted on their hands.
"'Putin endorsed him, for heaven’s sake,' Mrs. Bush erupted. 'Putin the killer! Putin the worst! He endorsed Trump! That’s an endorsement you don’t want," Bush reportedly said.