Trump Tower had just opened and “The Art of the Deal” was three years from publication when 38-year-old Donald Trump suggested he could negotiate Russian arms control better than Ronald Reagan.

“It would take an hour-and-a-half to learn everything there is to learn about missiles,” Trump told The Washington Post in 1984. Of dealmaking prowess, he said, “You either have it, or you don’t.”

Before there was much talk of a personal brand, Trump had landed on his: the consummate, swashbuckling, never-lose dealmaker.

As he zigzags the country for Republican candidates, from Florida to Alaska, Trump is exhorting voters to again embrace him as an unqualified success in a midterm election that has become a proxy referendum on his presidency and his record as a dealmaker.

“He’s not as good at this as he thinks he is,” said Christopher Preble, senior fellow and director of the Reimagining U.S. Grand Strategy program at the Stimson Center, an international security think tank.

He insisted that Iran would be defeated in mere weeks. He later brokered what he called a “great” ceasefire, though it quickly fizzled. Trump repeatedly has said Tehran is desperate to make a deal to end fighting. That also proved untrue.

He promised to negotiate an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine in a day but hasn't. He now has turned to Moscow to buy........

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