Corey Lewandowski, the pugnacious brawler who as soon as managed Donald Trump’s first presidential marketing campaign, will simply not go away. No, actually. He has apparently exceeded the 130 days he can function a “special government employee”—however he’s not leaving.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump shakes fingers with Corey Lewandowski earlier than he speaks at a marketing campaign rally on Oct. 23, 2023, in Derry, New Hampshire.
Lewandowski has been a frequent presence on the Division of Homeland Safety, performing because the de facto chief of workers for Secretary Kristi Noem and amassing energy at DHS. He’s fired folks, signed off on billions of {dollars} in grant funding, demanded that staff take polygraph checks, and went to battle on staff with pronouns of their bio. Fairly the busy boy for somebody with no official function.
As a way to get across the 130-day restrict, it seems that he’s simply not clocking in, as an alternative sliding in with different staff so he doesn’t should swipe his badge. It’s completely nice and funky to be taught that authorities constructing safety is so lax that it’s no downside for somebody to get in with out a badge.
Lewandowski has been protecting his personal time, and in line with him, he’s solely labored 69 days (good) since January 2025. The administration believes it’s an undercount, however so far, the White Home hasn’t taken any motion to take away the squatter.
Lewandowski’s employment standing is similar as Elon Musk had, however Musk actually did go away on the 130-day mark after launching his DOGE catastrophe. After all, that departure bought very messy when he began feuding with Trump.
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Lewandowski attracts no wage as an SGE, so it’s not like he’s clinging to this for the money. But when he leaves, he can’t proceed consolidating his energy at DHS. He most likely wouldn’t be capable to accompany Noem on journeys to Israel, Chile, Argentina, Costa Rica, Colombia, El Salvador, and Mexico, even when he’s her not-at-all-secret boyfriend.
It will be form of bizarre to carry your boyfriend to high-level conferences with abroad diplomats or let him steer no-bid authorities contracts to cronies, as Noem has finished with Lewandowski. However hey, Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth is letting his spouse assist run the Pentagon and bringing her to delicate conferences with overseas army leaders, so perhaps Lewandowski might simply preserve tagging together with Noem whereas she cosplays as a firefighter, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, and a border patrol cowgirl.
The actual downside for Lewandowski isn’t the 130-day restrict. If the White Home wished him to remain, they’d interact in difficult appointment shenanigans to let him accomplish that, similar to they did with Trump’s former private lawyer Alina Habba in her function as Performing U.S. Legal professional for the District of New Jersey. There, the White Home has strung collectively varied short-term methods to maintain her in her job regardless of not being confirmed by the Senate. But it surely’s Trump who doesn’t need Lewandowski in an official function, and it’s not like there’s any method round that.
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Reportedly, Trump refused to let Lewandowski change into Noem’s official chief of workers as a result of he was anxious in regards to the optics of him working for somebody he’s romantically concerned with. There’s additionally the small matter of each Noem and Lewandowski being married to different folks, neither of whom ever appear to be talked about.
So, potential romantic entanglements preserve you out of the administration, however inciting folks to kill cops is not any downside. Being a far-right troll who represented Andrew Tate? Totes cool. Hanging with white supremacists? You get to steer the U.S. Institute of Peace!
Nobody is aware of if the White Home will carry the hammer down on Lewandowski, however perhaps he can simply formally transfer in with Noem fairly than protecting an condominium throughout the road. It’s no chief of workers job, however not less than he’d avoid wasting cash on hire.
