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Kristi Noem’s Alleged Boyfriend Went on Crazed Journey to Get DHS Gun

People who denied Corey Lewandowski an officially issued firearm were passed over for promotions.

Corey Lewandowski speaks at a podium
Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto/Getty Images

Expired-special-employee Corey Lewandowski took it out on federal officials when he couldn’t get his way with a highly unusual quest.

Lewandowski, who entered the ranks of the Department of Homeland Security thanks to close proximity to rumored beau Kristi Noem, reportedly attempted to get his hands on a badge and federally issued gun, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The 52-year-old was relegated to the position of “special government employee” after he was denied the job of Noem’s chief of staff. His request to top ICE officials to receive a badge and weapon was highly unusual—not only due to the informal nature of his employment at DHS, but also because Lewandowski never received the basic prerequisite of law enforcement training.

In one instance detailed by the Journal, the Trump administration was planning to tap former ICE official Tom Feeley as the agency’s new director. But Lewandowski’s request—and Feeley’s rejection of it—subsequently lost Feeley the job.

Feeley wasn’t the only one to lose their DHS gig over Lewandowski’s power-hungry crusade. Realizing that he needed a legal justification for the gun, Lewandowski turned to ICE’s legal office, asking officials there to issue him a legal note recommending the weapon. One of the agency’s top attorneys, Ken Padilla, similarly refused.

Days later, Padilla was placed on administrative leave, and was later demoted and relocated to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, according to sources that spoke with the Journal.

Eventually, Lewandowski got what he wanted, managing to get other attorneys in the office to cave to his demands. In the end, it was Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons that signed off on Lewandowski’s request via autopen.

Lewandowski has been tied into MAGA’s inner fold for years, having made his name as Donald Trump’s first campaign manager in the 2016 presidential race.

MAGA Senator Took Donation From Epstein Friend Before Key Vote

Ohio Senator Jon Husted received $3,500 from Les Wexner.

Ohio Senator Jon Husted walks in the Capitol
Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc/Getty Images

Ohio Senator John Husted accepted thousands of dollars in donations from one of Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged co-conspirators, before voting against releasing the Department of Justice’s files on the alleged sex trafficker.

As long as Husted has been in office, he has accepted money from Les Wexner, the former CEO of Victoria’s Secret whose name was inexplicably redacted out of the Epstein files until earlier this week. The Ohio Republican has raked in more than $116,000 from Wexner since 2001, when he first entered public office as a member of Ohio’s state House of Representatives.

Husted accepted $3,500 from Wexner as recently as July—only two months before he voted to block the release of the Epstein files, according to campaign finance records reviewed by TiffinOhio. In November, Husted, a steady MAGA sycophant, again voiced opposition to releasing files. But days later, the Epstein Files Transparency Act was passed through the Senate by unanimous consent.

Husted wasn’t the only one who accepted money from the Wexner: The billionaire doled out more than $250,000 in donations to Republican candidates in the past year, especially ones in his home state of Ohio, according to NOTUS.

In June, Wexner gave $3,500 to Senator Bernie Moreno, and a month later, the Republican senator claimed that the frenzy to release the Epstein files was being “fueled” by the media and Democrats—despite mounting calls from members of his own party to release the documents. In September, he joined Husted in voting against the files’ release, before ultimately agreeing to support the Epstein Files Transparency Act’s passage in November.

Wexner also gave $3,500 to Republican Representative Mike Carey, as well as one Democrat, Representative Joyce Beatty.

Wexner was among the six powerful men who had their names redacted by the DOJ, and his name appeared on a list of potential co-conspirators.

Kristi Noem Fired—and Immediately Rehired—Someone Over a Blanket

Yes, you read that right.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem looks to the side while sitting at an event
Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is under fire for pink-slipping a Coast Guard pilot and then rehiring them moments later, over a blanket.

Noem and her expired-special-employee chief adviser (and rumored beau) Corey Lewandowski are no strangers to a toxic work environment—rather, they seem to enjoy creating them. The duo are known for frequently berating their senior-level staff and have even demanded that employees submit to polygraph tests as exhibitions of loyalty.

But days after federal agents working under Noem’s purview shot and killed Alex Pretti in Minnesota, the DHS secretary snapped.

A maintenance issue on one of her planes had forced her to land and deboard to another aircraft, The Wall Street Journal reported late Thursday. The sudden switch inspired Lewandowski to fire the U.S. Coast Guard pilot from the first plane, though the pilot’s abilities weren’t the problem: Noem was upset that her blanket had not followed her to her second plane.

The pilot was told to take a commercial flight home when they reached their destination, according to the Journal’s report.

But moments later, Noem had to backtrack on the pilot’s terminated employment, though she didn’t do so in any admission of wrongdoing. Instead, Noem tapped the pilot to fly her around again because “no one else was available to fly them home,” reported the Journal.

A DHS spokeswoman declined to address the episode but told the newspaper that the secretary had “made personnel decisions to deliver excellence.”

Some of those personnel decisions have been nothing short of seismic. In 2025, Noem and Lewandowski completely reengineered Immigration and Customs Enforcement in their image, firing or demoting approximately 80 percent of the agency’s field leadership.

Their 2026 plans for the agency involve a massive “wartime recruitment” hiring spree that aims to take on as many as 10,000 new ICE officers in the coming year. Part of that strategy includes spending millions on social media advertisements targeted at gun rights advocates, UFC enthusiasts, and manosphere podcast audiences.

Meanwhile, AI-induced slip-ups have “sent many new recruits into field offices without proper training,” according to law enforcement officials.

Trump Official Who Helped Kill USAID Now Using Its Funds for Himself

Russ Vought, White House Office of Management and Budget director, has decided what is happening with USAID funds.

OMB Director Russ Vought
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
OMB Director Russ Vought

Office of Budget and Management Director Russell Vought killed USAID, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths, and is now using the money he “saved” to bankroll his security detail.

A Reuters report Friday states that the Project 2025 architect who promised to put federal employees “in trauma” is spending $15 million of former USAID funding—money that would have gone toward fighting HIV, polio, malaria, and other diseases—to pay his U.S. Marshal security through the end of the year.

One source told Reuters that Vought has more than a dozen U.S. marshals in his security detail.

While Vought allegedly faced a threat on his life last month, the irony of the man who ripped disease-fighting funding away from some of the most at-risk people in the world only to use it to beef up his personal bodyguard staff is impossible to ignore.

This is yet another example of Trump officials’ questionable personal spending habits. On Thursday, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Department of Homeland Security is leasing a $70 million jet that Secretary Kristi Noem and her alleged boyfriend Corey Lewandowski use to travel in luxury. And what’s up with that $400 million White House ballroom?

Epstein Was in Touch With Trump Team Just Before Inauguration

Jeffrey Epstein was in close contact with officials in President Trump’s first term.

A protester holds a poster with a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump, alongside the words "Nothing To See Here."
Fabrice COFFRINI/AFP/Getty Images
A protester at the World Economic Forum in Davos holds a poster with photos of Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump, January 18, 2026.

Disgraced sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein said he had “new administration people” visiting his Little Saint James Island in 2016—just a month before President Trump’s first inauguration. 

In a December 2016 email to Bill Gates, Epstein told him to “come to visit the island. New administration people visiting.” 

We can only speculate which people from the colorful cast of Trump characters were on pedophile island, but one possibility is Steve Bannon, Trump’s then adviser, who had a genuine friendship with Epstein. Stephen Feinberg, now Trump’s deputy secretary of defense, was also close to Trump in his first term and has been named in the files.

“These people are playing in our faces,” political commentator Nina Turner wrote on X. ”They need to be charged. Period.”

“Donald Trump did drain the swamp, right from the White House to Epstein Island,” one X user wrote.

This document only publicly reaffirms the connection to the perverted financier that people in both Trump’s first and second term have had—and in some cases lied about. On Thursday, another email from 2016 showed Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz inviting Epstein to his Valentine’s Day party—eight years after Epstein was registered as a sex offender. And on Wednesday,  Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick admitted he visited Epstein’s pedophile island with his wife and children in 2012 after he lied dramatically about cutting off all contact with the predator.