Donald Trump's national political director leaves campaign
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On Wednesday night, the Donald Trump campaign announced it had parted ways with Rick Wiley, its national political director.
Campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks did not respond to Politico's inquiry of whether Wiley was fired or resigned, but sources say he was fired. Wiley was hired by Paul Manafort, who joined the Trump campaign in late March as chairman, and sources say he never clicked with campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. Sources tell Politico Wiley also clashed with Karen Giorno, who ran Trump's campaign during the Florida Republican primary. He would often refuse to take her calls or return her emails, and after she shared this information with Trump, he ordered Wiley to keep away from Giorno and not call her or email her, the sources said.
In a statement, the Trump campaign said Wiley was "hired on a short-term basis as a consultant until the campaign was running full steam," and now it is "doing better than ever." A Trump source told Politico that Wiley, who served as campaign manager for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) during his failed bid for the Republican nomination, "has RNC tattooed on his forehead. He's not part of the Trump culture. Wiley was someone who didn't understand what we were able to do, and he wasn't interested in being a part of the team in the end anyway."
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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