CHAPTER 3
While I won’t be running for Governor of New York State, a race I would have won, I have much bigger plans in mind—stay tuned, will happen!
—@REALDONALDTRUMP, MARCH 14, 2014, 5:27 P.M.
Stop pretending—Donald Trump is not running for president.
—KYLE SMITH, NEW YORK POST, MAY 30, 2015
IT’S HARD TO SAY what makes a person want to run for president. All the scrutiny, the travel, the time and money you have to spend—it’s a physical, mental, and emotional gauntlet. Some people do it because others want them to, and some run just to spite the ones who don’t. The press came up with all sorts of reasons why Donald Trump was running: “He’s just building his brand,” they wrote. “He’s got a new TV deal,” they said. “It’s all ego-driven,” they opined.
But it wasn’t ego, because it was never about him. One night, he was talking to Keith Schiller, a guy who’s known him longer than any of us. Before he had signed on as Mr. Trump’s bodyguard in 1999, Keith had been an NYPD narcotics detective in the Thirty-Fourth Precinct in Manhattan, an area then known for intense drug trafficking. During drug raids, it was Keith’s job to break down the doors with a battering ram. Fiercely loyal, once Keith started working for Mr. Trump he wanted no other job. Whether the boss was doing a quality check on a new property or making his way through a throng of fans who wouldn’t stop pawing at him, Keith was there. Keith has been such a constant in Mr. Trump’s life, the Trump kids think of him as an uncle—an uncle who would take a bullet for their father. On this night, early in the campaign, they were in the limo, looking out at a crowd that had gathered in the street.
“You and me, Keith, we’re hotter than we’ve ever been,” Trump said. “This is big shit.”
“Yes, sir,” Keith said. “Running for president of the United States, sir. Leader of the free world, sir.”
“Yep, you and me.”
By 2013, Dave started working with a young lawyer named Sam Nunberg who was helping Trump with scheduling, writing some political speeches, and navigating the political landscape. Roger Stone, a longtime Trump associate, had introduced Nunberg to Trump. Still, it seemed that whenever Trump had a question about politics, whether it be new poll numbers or policy positions, one of the people he would call was Dave. In time, Dave learned to stick close to the phone; calls from Trump could come at any time.
That February, Donald Trump—at that time, a very famous TV star but still something of a political unknown—attended the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) with Dave. There, Trump opened the second day with a speech that received mixed reviews from the audience. Though always self-confident, the future president wasn’t nearly as persuasive from the podium as he would become. Maybe with a trained eye one would recognize the sparks of electricity he generated then weren’t all that different from the nova he would become in front of fan-filled stadiums two years later. But there weren’t many eyes trained on Donald Trump in those days—not the right eyes, anyway.
“You have to start donating to the Republicans,” Dave told him one day. “You can’t be Republican nominee if the only people you give to are Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi.”
Trump bristled. “I’m a businessman,” he said. “I give to everyone.”
But Dave had done the research. “Yes, you’re a businessman,” he said. “But no, you’re not giving to everyone. You’re giving to mostly Democrats.”
Dave made a list of Republican members of Congress and senators running campaigns across the country, and then suggested a budget of $500,000. He recommended that he start writing checks for each of the names on his list for the maximum allowed by the FEC—$2,600 per election, and he began introducing Trump to some of the bigger names to whom he donated. Rick Santorum, the winner of the 2012 Iowa caucuses, visited Trump’s office with his daughter, Sarah Maria, to express his thanks.
Once Mr. Trump aligned his political donations with his politics, Dave set out to see how the candidate would do on the road.
Around this time, Dave and J. T. Mastanadi, Citizens United’s political director, came up with an idea of putting together events that would host presidential hopefuls in the first primary states: New Hampshire, Iowa, and South Carolina. These events would be a who’s who of conservative politics, all-day-long political events held for die-hard conservative and libertarian audiences—people who lived for politics. The “Freedom Summits,” as Dave and the Citizens United team had decided to call them, would be the earliest events in the presidential election cycle. And they would set the stage for the stampede of Republican presidential contenders that would follow.
While Dave was busy refining the concept for the first Freedom Summit, to be held in New Hampshire in April 2014, Corey Lewandowski was working as the national director of voter registration for Americans for Prosperity (AFP). The advocacy group was part of the vast network of David and Charles Koch, the two richest and most politically active libertarians in the country.
Corey’s role at AFP required him to oversee all voter registration efforts throughout the country and to run recruitment campaigns that would champion certain conservative and libertarian causes. He and his wife, Alison, then had four kids, one girl and three boys. After a few years running several hectic statewide campaigns, Corey seemed to have finally settled into a calm, structured job in an office.
The office happened to be in Londonderry, New Hampshire, a quiet town on the state’s southern border that consisted mostly of apple orchards and small, tight-knit neighborhoods. It was located just a few miles down the road from the Courtyard Manchester, the hotel where it was decided to hold the first Freedom Summit. Locals just called the hotel “the Yard.”
We knew each other only by reputation. At least mostly. We had met briefly and had talked on the phone. But Dave had heard plenty about Donald Trump’s future campaign manager. On National Tax Day in 2010, Corey had helped organize a Tea Party tax revolt on the lawn of the New Hampshire State House in Concord, and managed to draw thousands of people to the event. Later that day, he took to the stage in Manchester and debated a life-size cardboard cutout of New Hampshire’s Democratic governor, John Lynch. He took a few swings at Lynch for being a short guy, then slapped a “big spender” sticker right on his flat cardboard lapel. The crowd, mostly angry, tax-loathing conservatives, laughed and cheered. Two weeks later, with his wife, Alison, about to give birth, Corey hosted the presidential hopefuls Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, Michele Bachmann, and Herman Cain at a dinner held by Americans for Prosperity—no small feat, considering it was nine months until the beginning of the primary season, a long way out for most big-name candidates.
It was clear that Corey knew New Hampshire politics cold. If there was anyone with whom Dave could partner to stage a Freedom Summit there, it was Corey.
It was September 2013 when the communications director of Citizens United introduced us. Jeff Marschner had worked for Dave for four years by then and had known Corey when they both worked in the US Senate in the early 2000s. They both used to work for the senator of New Hampshire, Bob Smith; Marschner as the senator’s deputy press secretary, and Corey as his campaign manager. Right off the bat, we formed a strong team.
Around this time, Dave commissioned a poll by Kellyanne Conway testing Mr. Trump in an election for the governor of New York against the incumbent, Andrew Cuomo. Dave, JT, and Jeff traveled to Trump Tower to review the first night’s results with Mr. Trump. Trump suggested that we add this question to the poll: “Would you rather see Donald J. Trump run for governor of New York or president of the United States?”
The New Hampshire Freedom Summit was an unqualified success. Dave was able to lure big Republican names such as former Speaker Newt Gingrich, Governor Mike Huckabee, Senator Ted Cruz, and Senator Rand Paul, while Corey brought in New Hampshire senator Kelly Ayotte; Arthur C. Brooks, a leading conservative voice and the president of the American Enterprise Institute; New Hampshire House Speaker Bill O’Brien; and tax fighter Tom Thomson, the son of the famous New Hampshire governor Meldrim “Ax the Tax” Thomson. The event also drew Tennessee congresswoman Marsha Blackburn, Utah senator Mike Lee, the radio host Laura Ingraham, and the Iowa Republican heavyweight congressman Steve King. The speakers needed no introduction for the Freedom Summit crowd. It was an all-star cast playing before a full house.
Going into the event, Paul and Cruz were the biggest stars, and both delivered strong speeches. In that faraway time, Rand Paul was the early front-runner for the nomination, and he roused the crowd with signature issues such as civil liberties and pushing back against the National Security Administration and the blanket surveillance of everyday Americans by the Obama administration.
Cruz displayed his talent as an orator by talking about growing the Republican brand and reaching out to Hispanics and others most affected by the stagnant economy.
But as good as Cruz and Paul were, the event was Trump’s.
A crowd of about a thousand packed the conference center at the Yard. These were limited-government conservatives and libertarians. Mr. Trump walked out onto the stage with Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” playing on the sound system. He talked off the cuff about things like trade and the economy—not quite the orthodoxy to which the room typically ascribed. But he had them in the palm of his hand. The biggest applause line was for what he was then calling the border fence.
Then he indulged in a half hilarious, half serious, eight-minute riff on why politicians shouldn’t be allowed to use teleprompters. But the most memorable thing he said that day went almost unnoticed. Though he had used the phrase before, it was the first time he had used the words as a rallying cry.
“There is something we have to do, and we have to do it fast,” he said. “We have to make America great again.”
Only looking back can we see the moment for what it was: a turning point in American campaigning. From a messenger, the likes of which had never appeared in American politics, came a complete repudiation of the status quo. Donald Trump was about to start throwing lightning bolts at the ruling elite. And no one—not the government, the media, the Catholic Church or the Republican Party (never mind the Democrats)—would be safe.
Hunter S. Thompson once wrote, “Probably the rarest form of life in American politics is the man who can turn on a crowd and still keep his head straight.” Onstage, Donald Trump was like a machine that learns as it goes. As his audiences grew, he seemed to grow with them, feeding off their energy. Manchester that day might not have been the first time Mr. Trump showed such talent in a political setting populated with serious presidential candidates. He had spoken at CPAC all the way back in 2013. But at the Freedom Summit in Manchester, he showed a glimpse of what he would perfect on the campaign trail, a combination of Teddy Roosevelt’s love of verbal combat, the charm and celebrity of Ronald Reagan, and the pure brashness of Donald J. Trump. In Manchester, Trump the candidate began to emerge. Even at that early moment, he was head and shoulders above any of the other speakers. He went way beyond his allotted time to speak. Nothing new. We had to cancel a video that was supposed to play during lunch. But we didn’t care, nor did the people in the audience; nearly all of them had their cell phones out, recording the speech in photographs and on video—a phenomenon that would continue at events throughout his campaign. Nor did the press, which included a live feed by C-SPAN. They were all under Trump’s spell.
From that night on, campaign politics would never be the same—not that anybody knew it then, not even those of us who are supposed to know what we’re doing in the business. Heck, we still didn’t believe he would run.
Even though he’d beguiled the press, the mainstream reporters were reluctant to interview Donald Trump after the event for fear of being laughed off the phone by their editors. That wasn’t the case with Bannon, then the host of Breitbart on Sirius Radio. Bannon couldn’t wait to get Trump on the air.
It was Dave who introduced Bannon to Trump back in August 2010. Dave and Bannon have been friends and business partners since 2006, churning out documentary films including Fire from the Heartland, which chronicled Tea Party women, including Ann Coulter and Michele Bachmann, and Generation Zero, about the global roots of the financial meltdown. Dave was the producer on the films, which Steve wrote and directed. One morning, Dave asked Bannon if he’d be interested in meeting Donald Trump.
“Why?” Bannon asked. He was swamped with movies and running Breitbart full time.
“He’s thinking of running for president,” Dave said.
Steve let out a short laugh. “Yeah? Of what country?”
Though his answer was glib, Bannon did not think of Trump as the lightweight that most people in politics then did. He’d be willing to meet him, so long as he was serious.
They met in Trump’s office on the twenty-sixth floor of Trump Tower. Dave had prepared a presentation and went over every single aspect of a presidential primary campaign for Trump. In extensive detail, he walked him through what he would need to do for each of the first three primary states: Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. Dave compared an early campaign for president to running for governor in three states. He told Trump whom he would have to hire, and what each hire’s job would be. He went over the field that Trump would be up against and the issues that would matter in the race. He told him how much it would cost. It was a master class in primary politics, and Trump was enthusiastically engaged. Bannon, who at the time was the executive chairman of Breitbart News, was impressed with Trump’s mastery of the Socratic method of learning.
As they walked out of Trump Tower that day, Dave asked Bannon what he thought the chances were of Trump running for president in 2012.
“It’s amazing how quickly he picks up on stuff,” Steve said. “But he’s got a zero chance. Less than zero.”
But that was then. By 2014, Bannon had completely rethought his assessment. By 2016, he would be helping to steer Trump’s campaign.
It was after Trump’s interview with Bannon at the New Hamp-shire Freedom Summit that Dave introduced Corey to his future boss. Trump was there with Keith Schiller and Sam Nunberg. They chatted with us for a few minutes. We had our hands full. We had handled, line-by-line, the travel arrangements for all of the speakers and were then dealing with the logistics of getting everyone home. We didn’t have to worry about getting Donald Trump home, who seemed in no hurry to leave. Instead, he asked Dave if his son liked helicopters.
A short while later, Dave and Griffin, along with Dave’s friend Matt Palumbo and his son Dean piled into Trump’s SUV and headed to the nearby airfield. There the Sikorsky S-76, the one with kid leather seats and 24-karat plate gold fixtures, lifted off, tilted north, and headed for a quick, ten-minute spin over the White Mountains. When we landed, Mr. Trump told Griffin that the ride just cost him $5,000. “That’s how much I like your dad,” he said. It wouldn’t be the last time Donald Trump gave kids helicopter rides. And the next time would prove to be one of the greatest campaign spectacles ever.
Corey was impressed by Trump. The thought of working for him, however, never entered his mind. But Fate and Dave had already begun to conspire to align the two men’s paths. The next step that brought Corey closer to Trump came a few weeks later.
Dave was in Virginia watching his daughter Isabella play softball in a tournament when his phone rang. Mr. Trump was on his way to the 2014 White House Correspondents Association Dinner, held at the Washington Hilton.
“Are you going to the dinner?” Trump asked.
Dave wasn’t going anywhere. Isabella was playing her third of four games that day. Besides, he’d already been to his fill of correspondents dinners. He also didn’t get why Trump was going. Year after year, it seemed, he ended up the butt of the jokes. In 2011, Seth Myers torched him, and then Obama took his shots.
“I don’t have a tux,” Dave said.
“Come on,” Trump insisted. “We need to talk.”
“We can talk on the phone,” Dave said
“You’re missing the game!” Susan said to him.
“You have to get me a campaign manager,” Trump said. “You promised to get me one, now let’s get it done.”
The call, covering a broad range of issues and topics, lasted nearly an hour. By the time Dave hung up, he knew that he had better find Trump a campaign manager.
Over the next few months, Trump and Sam Nunberg called Dave regularly. There might have been only a handful of people in Washington with more connections and political knowledge than Dave. He could come up with a list of names and phone numbers right off the top of his head. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was twofold: One, finding someone who believed that Donald Trump would run for president. It was a significant risk, and the people Dave knew were already working in jobs and had families and mortgages. Those who were looking for jobs with campaigns were looking for candidates with stable political operations. Few would be willing to take a chance on something that might dry up in a few weeks or months.
The second reason might have been even more challenging. And that was finding someone with the right personality to work with Trump. The boss, as we would come to call him, was someone who liked to call the shots and wouldn’t stand for anything less than all you had. Though he knew him to be incredibly loyal and generous, Dave also knew he could be abrasive, to say the least. The big thing was, however, that Dave knew that Trump would not fit into a traditional campaign strategy or get along with a traditional political handler.
That’s when Corey Lewandowski came to mind.
Dave was aware that Corey had been involved in a bunch of statewide campaigns. He also knew he was running a division of the Koch Brothers’ Americans for Prosperity, which had cohosted the Freedom Summit without a hitch. Dave knew Corey had the temperament, personality, and character to handle Trump. But mostly he believed Corey was tough enough to work for the boss.
Corey grew up in Lowell, Massachusetts, a blue-collar old mill city of about 100,000. He lived in a small home on Coburn Street right next to a low-cost housing development, which, during the late 1980s, was overrun with crack cocaine and crime. One night, the police conducted surveillance of a drug operation right in his kitchen, watching through the window at the apartment complex next door. His parents separated early in his life, and his father died when he was in high school. His role model was his maternal grandfather, a union printer and World War II veteran, who lived with Corey’s grandmother about three city blocks away. It was his grandfather who instilled in Corey the value of hard work. From a paper route when he was nine, to working at Dunkin’ Donuts, to driving a forklift at Somerville Lumber, to his time in politics, Corey had been working hard his whole life.
He attended college at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. The only reason he could afford it was because his mother worked in the financial aid office. Still, at first, his college career looked like it was going to end before it got started. The core undergraduate courses—psychology, sociology, and English 101—bored him to tears, so he spent more time attending parties and chasing girls than he did in class. At the end of the first semester he was given a choice: go on academic probation or take a semester off. He opted for option number two. He was friendly with a girl whose family owned a dairy farm in upstate New York. He thought it would be an adventure. It turned out to be the hardest work he ever did—that is, until he became Donald Trump’s campaign manager. All day long, he was hauling hay and cleaning barns. The cows had to be milked twice a day, every day, in rain and snow and cold. In upstate New York, it snows a lot. His experience on the farm taught him two things. One was respect for farmers and the hard work they do—because of them you can just waltz into a store and pick up a container of milk. And two was that he’d better take school more seriously, because he sure didn’t want to be a farmer the rest of his life.
Back in school, he took all the core classes over again and aced all of them, doing especially well in the writing course. He would end up graduating cum laude from UMass and being accepted into graduate school at American University in Washington, DC, where he obtained his master’s degree in American Government and Public Policy.
In the fall of 1997, he applied to the Republican National Committee’s campaign management college.
Soon after graduating from the course, he researched every incumbent Republican member of congress who had received less than 55 percent of the vote in his or her last election. He then sent a résumé and followed up with a phone call to every one of them. His efforts paid off. Dave DiStefano, the chief of staff to Congressman Robert W. Ney (R-OH) called back and asked Corey if he would come to Ohio to discuss the congressman’s upcoming reelection effort.
Corey stayed with Ney through two successful campaign cycles, during which time he forged a close relationship with the congressman. In 2000, Corey went to work at the Republican National Committee as the Northeast’s legislative political director, a position in which he raised funds, recruited candidates, and served as the liaison to the national committee. Though he loved building resources for Republican campaigns, he longed for one of his own.
He got his chance in 2002, but it was short lived. After Smith lost the primary to John E. Sununu Jr., who had the full backing of the Bush family, Corey turned his attention to matters outside of politics. He married Alison and started a family. He sold real estate for a while and worked for a PR firm. He then considered a career as a police officer. He enrolled in the New Hampshire police academy and graduated in 2006, a week before his daughter, Abigail, was born. Still, round-the-clock tours and small paychecks were hard to manage for a guy with a growing family. Besides, there was something else calling him away from any other career.
By 2008 he was back in politics, where he belonged, taking the job with the Kochs’ Americans for Prosperity.
It was in October 2014 when Dave first approached Corey with the idea to work for Trump. It was just before the midterm elections, and Corey was overseeing voter registration for the whole country. By that time, Corey had been with Americans for Prosperity for seven years. The organization had opened an office for him one exit from his home in Windham, New Hampshire. In addition to the importance of his position, which Corey took very seriously, he was in a pretty good situation. He liked what he was doing and where he was doing it. That said, Corey will always consider an opportunity when presented with one. So when Dave said, “Hey, Trump may be running. Do you have any interest in speaking to him?” Corey answered, “Sure.”
And with that one small word, his life changed forever.