Donald Trump wants to crush The Swamp. The leaks, the sneaks, and the secrets are all there. Our writers, David Gardner, Farrah Tomazin, and Sarah Ewall-Wice, are sifting through the ooze so you don’t have to. Don’t miss out.
In this week’s news from the ooze: Jason Jackson, Pam Bondi, Ted Cruz, Beatrix Potter, Greg Bovino, Fancy James, Linda McMahon, Lee Zeldin, Reza Pahlavi, Brittany Hugoboom, Kamala Harris, Russ Vought, Usha Vance, Candace Owens, RFK Jr., Melania Trump, Peter Rabbit, and Kimber-lay Guilfoyle.
Trump’s Trusty Cabinet Moneymakers—and the Biggest Suck-Up Who Didn’t Pay
Donald Trump’s suck-up Cabinet members have put their money where their mouths are, The Swamp has learned.
All but three members of the president’s top team have given a new meaning to the term ‘pay to play” by pumping millions into Trump’s campaign coffers.
If draining the Swamp was Trump’s big re-election pitch, monetizing it during Trump 2.0 seems to have become his governing philosophy.
A new report from the watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has found that 20 out of 23 Trump Cabinet members opened their wallets to the tune of at least $35 million flowing into Trump’s campaigns, super PACs, and inauguration fund.
“There’s probably a lot we don’t know about at all,” veteran political analyst Larry Sabato tells The Swamp, referencing America’s murky campaign finance laws.
“There’s just never been a presidency like this. He has made Nixon look great.”
Former wrestling executive turned Education Secretary Linda McMahon alone pumped at least $20 million into Trump-aligned super PACs during the 2024 cycle, according to federal filings. That includes funding tied to Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally—the would-be grand finale that instead veered off-script into a sideshow of surrogates cracking ugly jokes about Puerto Rico, immigrants, and Kamala Harris.
Then there’s Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who dropped more than $10 million into two pro-Trump super PACs, including Turnout for America and MAGA Inc.
Small Business Administrator Kelly Loeffler and her husband Jeffrey Sprecher chipped in—over $3 million to MAGA Inc.
JD Vance, Marco Rubio, (the now departed) Kristi Noem, Scott Bessent, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, Chris Wright, Brooke Rollins, Tulsi Gabbard, Jamieson Greer, Lee Zeldin, and Susie Wiles all made political contributions, according to CREW, “either themselves or through committees they controlled, to Trump-aligned 2024 groups.”
Pam Bondi reportedly had stocks in Trump Media & Technology Group and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Doug Burgum and Doug Collins attended an America First Policy Institute gala at Mar-A-Lago. Russell Vought also visited Trump properties.
Critics argue the arrangement tests long-standing norms meant to separate public office from private gain, while pushing the boundaries of the Emoluments Clause, a constitutional measure designed to prevent federal officials, particularly the president, from accepting gifts, titles, or profits without Congressional consent.
The White House has yet to respond to the findings, but Trump and his allies have often dismissed general concerns about campaign finances by insisting his business success predates politics. Meanwhile, the president’s personal bottom line is ballooning. Forbes now pegs his net worth at $6.5 billion, up from an estimated $3 billion when he took office in 2025. That number that keeps climbing as his political and business worlds blur into one big revenue stream. Hotels, events, campaign cash, the presidential library, red hats, commemorative coins, bibles, crypto — it all circulates in the same gilded ecosystem.
The Swamp can also answer the crucial question Trump must be asking—who were the three Cabinet members who did not give him a bean?
We are told they are Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, CIA Director John Ratcliffe … and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth—which might explain why he’s the biggest suck-up of them all!
Who Knew?
The sad, sordid story of how Kristi Noem’s husband Bryon Noem posed as “Jason Jackson” to crossdress in enormous fake breasts and pink female workout clothes, while paying thousands to fetish models, telling them that he enjoyed their “huge, huge ridiculous boobs” raises some significant questions. Not only “what did I just read?” but a far more serious one: Who knew? Every cabinet member’s background is supposed to be rigorously probed for blackmail risks before they are confirmed. Probed, in fact, by the FBI. Which means hack-prone Kash Patel should have known about the Noems’ bizarre vulnerabilities. Of course, strange fetishes are well-known in FBI history. In fact, Mr. Noem looks like he might have had something to dish about with J. Edgar Hoover.
Going Out of Business … MAGA for Sale at CPAC Flea Market
The Conservative Political Action Conference used to feel like a power bazaar — big names, bigger egos, and donor money sloshing around late into the night. Now it feels less like a gathering of influence and more like a niche convention filled with MAGA’s fringe-of-the-fringe podcasters, influencers, lawmakers, and grifters.
But this year’s jamboree in Texas, ignored by Trump who preferred golf and Mar-a-Lago fundraisers, was even flatter than most. Speakers including Senator Ted Cruz and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche played to rows of empty chairs. Familiar faces skipped it altogether, some angered by the presence of Jeffrey Epstein pal Steve Bannon.
And by the time the after-parties kicked off, the veneer of a big-tent movement slipped, replaced by a smaller, harder-edged crowd that seemed less interested in expanding the coalition than circling the wagons. Take the Republicans for National Renewal’s “Texas Round Up” shindig at the Dallas Cowboys Golf Club, which had billed itself as the “CPAC after party” of the week. Notorious (and fired) Border Force commander Greg Bovino, just a day out of retirement, was a marquee guest, regaling the crowd with stories of unmet ambition to deport 100 million people.
Pizzagate conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec was M.C., paying homage to Kyle Rittenhouse, the gun rights activist whose claim to fame was fatally shooting two men during civil unrest in Kenosha when he was 17. Other guests included former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio (who never took off his Aviators); “Second Amendment absolutist” Brandan Herrera (fresh from his GOP primary victory against disgraced Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales) and (checks notes) Romanian presidential runner up George Simion, a vocal supporter of Trump.
By the time the lights dimmed on the convention, the most memorable sights weren’t coming from the stage but the gatecrashers, like the woman outside in a “Deport Melania” cap, or the crew handing out copies of Trump’s infamous Epstein birthday letter like it was campaign swag. Not to mention countless Persian Americans lining up to see exiled Iranian crown prince Reza Pahlavi, seemingly unaware that Trump and his allies refer to him as “the loser Prince.” One journalist sitting next to The Swamp summed up perfectly how to deal with four days of this: He simply fell asleep.
Fancy a Job, James?
Kimber-lay Guilfoyle * isn’t leaving anything to chance in her role as U.S. Ambassador to Palm Beach/Greece. She tried auditioning a room full of Greece’s most influential/attractive businessmen a couple of months back for possible business/personal partner positions. Now she is making it an official search. She has advertised through the embassy for a “Bodyguard Coordinator.” Presumably, that means she has already recruited a flock of guards to keep her safe and now all she needs is a co-ordinator to get them matching outfits. If she needs a staffer with style, perhaps she should consider her PB stylist, Fancy James?
(* It’s how Trump said he says it…)
Second Lady Snowflake Isn’t Taking Any Woke Chances
Paranoia digs deep in the White House, and even Usha Vance is feeling the heat. One would think that her new YouTube channel, “Storytime with the Second Lady,” should be a pretty good bet for positive feedback. Her chat about Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Peter Rabbit has no hidden message about Trump’s America. Peter (the rabbit) is rather mischievous and eventually goes to bed after his mother (also a rabbit) offers him a cup of chamomile tea. So, just a little woke. The other two episodes released to date are about Disney’s Cars and Playground Lessons. There were fewer than 2,500 subscribers 36 hours after launch, but snowflake Usha wasn’t taking any chances. She has turned off the comments.
MAGA’s Tastemaker’s Very Scathing Verdict on a Surprise Demo
In the upside down world of MAGA, former model Brittany Hugoboom, has carved out a place as a tastemaker. The 34-year-old mother and her husband founded Evie Magazine, a publication routinely referred to as “Conservative Cosmopolitan." Inside its glossy pages, a handbook chock full of trad wife dating tips, Trumpy fashion advice (Cowgirl core is making a comeback, apparently) and where to get your best beef tallow. Hugoboom’s mag will also tell you which vaccine conspiracy you should endorse, and which are déclassé.
Encased in glossy pages strewn with pictures of come-hither-but-follow-the-six-inch-rule young ladies in milkmaid dresses (which Hugoboom also retails) are features like “Woman’s History Month is a Scam” and “Centering Your Life Around Romantic Love.”
Evie is billed as an alternative to so-called feminist mainstream media. But what happens when the outsiders like Hugoboom become the ultimate insiders? The Swamp hotfooted it to Manhattan’s Upper East Side to find out, meeting Hugoboom near the refurbished Waldorf-Astoria to talk MAGA, MAHA, and magazines, over $11 coffees. Hugoboom eschewed the milkmaid trad-wife look, wearing a more Upper East Side of Manhattan leopard print full-body dress and gold (natch) hoops.
So, the woman whose magazine gave Candace Owens her first multi-page spread, who is followed by Ivanka Trump on Instagram, and has been praised by Brett Cooper for conservative values, should be loving the MAGA moment, right?
Err, not entirely. Sadly, MAGA was far more chic when it was the counterculture—and less so when, under Trump, the new mainstream is defined by 20-something podcasters running amok in Washington.
“It just looks bad,” Hugoboom lamented of Washington’s social circles, rolling her eyes at the mere mention of the MAGA-coded restaurant Butterworth’s, and the infamous New York Magazine cover story of Young Republican partygoers titled the “Cruel Kids Table.” As for D.C. itself, Hugoboom said her friends tell her it has a major downside. “Not great dating.”
Hugoboom bristles at the mention of far-right “groypers” and other male extremists that have taken root in Trump’s party. “There’s so much infighting,” she adds. And don’t get her started on the men in that Louis Theroux documentary.
Her ultimate verdict on the next generation of MAGA stars? “Cringe.”
For those seeking more conservative high-class enlightenment, worry not, the next edition of Evie is out in April: The Sex Issue. For married women only…
