Donald Trump’s administration has recruited a college senior to help the president’s re-hired ex-‘body man’ lead a purge of anti-Trump government officials.
Politico reported Tuesday that 23-year-old James Bacon has become the right-hand man to John McEntee, who the president put in charge of the Presidential Personnel Office.
McEntee, who’s 29, was fired from the White House in March 2018 after he couldn’t get a security clearance due to an alleged gambling problem. He was rehired and is leading a purge of never-Trump government officials, according to reporting from Axios.
James Bacon (right) has become the right-hand man of John McEntee, the director of the Presidential Personnel Office, who President Trump (left) has tasked to lead a purge of ‘anti-Trumpers’ from the government
John McEntee (center), walking to Marine One with Kellyanne Conway (left) and Stephen Miller (right) was originally fired in March 2018 due to an alleged gambling problem
After surviving impeachment, President Trump has reportedly asked John McEntee to purge the government of anti-Trump officials
James Bacon, photographed at his high school graduation, worked his way up from Trump campaign intern
James Bacon’s father Jim wrote an enthusiastic post on Facebook about his son’s work, as the now-23-year-old worked his way up the chain from Trump 2016 campaign intern
Bacon joins McEntee after having a long list of Trump-related jobs, starting with being an intern on the Trump campaign, according to his LinkedIn page.
The GW senior also was a motorcade driver, during the year and five months Trump was running for president.
He moved up the chain to being a congressional relations intern, doing advance work for the campaign and then had an operations job during the two-month transition.
Since then, according to Politico, Bacon worked at the Department of Housing and Urban Development where he acted as Secretary Ben Carson’s ‘confidential assistant.’
He was most recently at the Department of Transportation, Politico said, briefly working in the policy shop.
Bacon’s role will be that of PPO’s director of operations, Politico said, where he’ll work on the vetting of job candidates.
Axios reported that on Thursday McEntee led a meeting of White House liaisons from cabinet agencies and asked them to identify potential ‘never-Trumpers’ who could be purged from the U.S. government.
Three sources familiar with the Thursday meeting described to Axios what happened, including that McEntee suggested that some of the firings of ‘bad people’ and ‘deep state’ would have to take place after the November election.
McEntee also explained how those individuals could be sabotaged in the meantime, saying at the meeting that employees deemed as anti-Trump would be shifted around, denying them promotions.
An earlier report cited administration officials who said ‘Trump feels he’s surrounded by snakes and wants to clear out all the disloyal people.’
Trump has already started purging individuals who testified before House committees, which led to his impeachment.
He removed Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman – and Vindman’s twin brother Yevgeny.
Both brothers did work for the National Security Council.
Trump also ousted E.U. Amb. Gordon Sondland, who also testified.
Sondland was a Trump political donor before being appointed to the European Union diplomatic post.
Trump asked for the resignation – and got it – of John Rood, a top policy official at the Pentagon who had certified last year that Ukraine was making enough progress in anti-corruption measures to receive the around $400 million in American aid dollars authorized by Congress.
Trump’s impeachment saga revolved around a scheme to hold up the military aid in order to pressure Ukraine’s president to announce investigations into Hunter and Joe Biden, a political rival of the president.
Trump has been emboldened by the U.S. Senate’s decision to acquit him on the two articles of impeachment approved by the House in December.
McEntee was fired and removed from the White House in March 2018 with the Wall Street Journal reporting that the dismissal was due to the aide having financial problems related to online gamling and his tax filings. McEntee was being investigated by the Secret Service for these issues when he was let go, the Journal said.
DailyMail.com reported that McEntee was gambling in real life too.
As he would spend time at the MGM National Harbor casino, located just down the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., in Oxon Hill, Maryland.
There, McEntee blew $250,000 on roulette.