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Following months of bitter campaign infighting,Donald Trumpfired his infamously hotheaded deputy,Corey Lewandowski,on Monday, afterIvanka Trumpreportedly gave her father an ultimatum: it’s him or me.
The potential future First Daughter, widely seen as one of Trump’s closest advisors, had been trying to convince him to fire the campaign manager for months, CNNreported. The final straw, according to several campaign reporters, was when Lewandowski allegedly tried to shop negative stories about Ivanka’s husband,New York Observerowner and campaign confidanteJared Kushner, who has been described as thesilent force behind Trump’s throne. Her brother,Eric Trump,had also become fed up with Lewandowski, CNN reports. On Sunday, Ivanka threatened to walk if the 42-year-old campaign manager remained. Less than a day later, he was gone.
In astatementfirst given toThe New York Times, which broke news of Lewandowski’s ouster morning, spokeswomanHope Hickstouted Trump’s candidacy, which Lewandowski was pivotal in building in the early months of the campaign, but said that Lewandowski “will no longer be working with the campaign.”
“The campaign is grateful to Corey for his hard work and dedication and we wish him the best in the future,” she added.
Lewandowski, who was reportedly surprised by his dismissal, was unceremoniously fired in the middle of a Monday morning meeting at Trump Tower. Securityescorted him out of the buildingshortly afterwards.
Lewandowski, one of the skeleton crew of staffers who famously turned Trump’s long-shot candidacy into an electoral juggernaut, burst onto the national scene after a physical altercation with then Breitbart reporterMichelle Fieldsin March. Trump refused to fire Lewandowski, instead accusing Fields first of making up the incident. He continued to stand by his staffer even when video evidence surfaced bolstering Fields’s claim.
In recent months, however, that loyalty wavered with the addition of political consultantPaul Manafortto the team. Ever since Manafortjoined Trumpin anticipation of a possible brokered convention, a scenario that died once Trump essentially clinched the nomination, the campaign has been wracked by infighting, according to numerous leaks and media stories. The reports only intensified when Trump named Manafort as his campaign chairman and chief strategist, and seemed tozigzagbetween following Manafort’s advice to act more presidential and Lewandowski’s insistence that Trump be Trump.
“THE CAMPAIGN IS GRATEFUL TO COREY FOR HIS HARD WORK AND DEDICATION AND WE WISH HIM THE BEST IN THE FUTURE.”
TheTimesnoted in their report that Lewandowski did not take Manafort's addition well, often undermining Manafort's hires and sometimes reversing his decisions, as he did withR.N.C. aide Rick Wiley. Lewandowski also seemed to be losing his temper: in one particularly ugly incident, Lewandowski was reportedlycaught in a public screaming match with Hickslast month. Longtime Trump allyRoger Stone,meanwhile, had taken to calling the campaign manager“Loserdowski.”
Manafort appears to have won, after successfullykeeping Lewandowski on the fifth floor of Trump Tower, all but eliminating his personal access to Trump—the source of Lewandowski’s influence in the first place. And just in time, too: Trump’s recent string of horrifying comments has begun to alienate the Republican Party to the point where its leadership has begun regularly disavowing him. Several Republicans are planning a convention revolt, and even the N.R.A. has had todistance itself from one of his statements on guns. Perhaps most important, Trump’s team is hurting for cash—something Lewandowski should have been on top of—forcing the campaign to send outits first ever fund-raising e-mailon Saturday. Someone’s head had to roll.
Trump campaign insidersseemed relieved, to the point that one top advisor tweeted“The witch is dead!”That advisor,Michael Caputo,soon offered his resignation, saying that he regretted the tweet and thought it would distract from the campaign: “In hindsight, that was too exuberant a reaction to this personnel move.”
Out of all the reporters who tweeted furious responses to the news, one seemed particularly happy:
(VANITY FAIR)
