Donald Trump considered firing his campaign manager Chris LaCivita after a bombshell report by the Daily Beast enraged the former president in the final stretch of his 2024 White House bid.
Sources told The Atlantic allegations that LaCivita had pocketed $22 million from his work on the Trump campaign and related super PACs, left Trump “fuming” and feeling like the story “made him look like a fool.”
The Beast’s story, published on Oct. 15, reportedly fueled the GOP presidential nominee‘s paranoia about disloyalty within his inner circle. Trump’s reaction came at a time when his controversial political strategist Corey Lewandowski was raising questions about the campaign’s spending.
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News of LaCivita’s payday left Trump ranting to friends and claiming he would fire the campaign manager, and potentially his entire team, if it weren’t so close to Election Day. However, one campaign staffer was ultimately fired after attempting to blow the whistle on what she called “grift and greed” and an alleged “bugging plot” by top campaign officials.
The former president’s spokesman, Stephen Cheung, denied that Trump was angered by the Beast’s report and said “Everyone recognized it came from disgruntled individuals.”
But LaCivita told friends he felt like he was in an episode of The Apprentice waiting to be told “you’re fired” during a ride to the airport in the back of Trump’s limo on Oct. 18, according to The Atlantic. Moments later, on Trump’s plane, the former president reportedly pulled out a printed copy of Beast’s story during a profanity-laced meeting in which LaCivita defended himself.
Trump campaign aides told the Atlantic’s Tim Alberta that the GOP presidential candidate took to calling LaCivita “my $22 million man!” in what Alberta wrote was a “teasingly” but conspicuous dig.
While senior aides told The Atlantic that the multi-million dollar scandal was somewhat settled, a tweet by LaCivita from Jan. 6, 2021, unearthed the week after the Beast’s story, shattered the pair’s already fragile relationship.
The resurfaced social media message, liked by LaCivita, called for Trump to be removed via the 25th Amendment, prompted the former president to allegedly tell several people that his campaign manager was “dead to him.” While LaCivita would stay on for the remainder of the campaign, he would have no place in a second Trump administration or his future political operation.
Discord in Trump’s campaign reportedly extends beyond LaCivita and characterized much of his 2016 and 2020 campaigns.
This paranoia and tension, staffers say, transformed the home stretch to the election into the “most unpleasant of their careers,” with some reconsidering their once-aspirations of serving in a Trump White House.
