Section:GDN 1N PaGe:42 Edition Date:190831 Edition:01 Zone:S Sent at 30/8/2019 18:39 cYanmaGentaYellow
- The Guardian Sat urday 31 Aug ust 2019
42Trump’s gatekeeper in
Oval Offi ce fi red after
divulging family details
Joanna Walters
New YorkDonald Trump’s personal assistant,
who has sat directly outside the Oval
Offi ce since the beginning of his tumul-
tuous presidency , has been ousted
after leaking details about operations
and the Trump family.
Madeleine Westerhout, 28, resigned
abruptly on Thursday after Trump was
informed that she had been indis-
creet to some members of the media ,
according to the New York Times,
which fi rst reported on her departure.
Other media reports said she shared
too much information with reporters
at an off -the-record dinner in a hotel
in New Jersey while Trump was on a
working holiday at his golf resort in
the state this summer.
Westerhout is just the latest of many
aides and senior government leaders,
from cabinet level down, to exit the
Trump administration.
She was understood to have beenbarred from returning to her prized
White House spot on Friday while the
details of her departure were being
fi nalised.
The former Republican National
Committee aide also worked for the
2012 Republican presidential candi-
date, Mitt Romney.
Westerhout was known for her
loyalty to Trump and for her extraordi-
nary access to details of his day-to-day
professional and personal life, hold-
ing great power as a gatekeeper to the
president, while being far less famousoutside Washington than many in the
inner circle.
Westerhout was one of Trump’s
closest aides during the transition
period after he unexpectedly won
the presidential election in Novem-
ber 2016 but before his inauguration
and taking up residency in the White
House in January, 2017.
She was often seen escorting indus-
try chiefs and US and international
politicians and other fi gures to the
lifts in Trump Tower in New York,
Trump’s longtime residence and offi ce
on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, near
Central Park.
She became a familiar fi gure to
eagle-eyed television viewers and
reporters hanging about in the cav-
ernous, golden vestibule of the
skyscraper, going back and forth to
take people up to Trump’s offi ce, but
she was never at the microphone talk-
ing to the public, and relatively few
knew her identity.
Trump came to trust Westerhout
and she has been at his side for a rela-
tively long time.
Sources told the US broadcaster
CBS that she had been drinking and
disclosed private details about the
president’s family. She also allegedly
gossiped about TV news personalities
seeking access to the president. Cur-
rent and former White House offi cials
told CBS that they found her to be a
divisive personality and suspected she
was disloyal to the president.▲ Madeleine Westerhout had access
to Donald Trump’s daily diaryKim Willsher
ParisWanted: Napoleon Bonaparte imper-
sonator. Ability to speak French
preferred. Tailor-made breeches,
boots and bicorne hat provided.
An unusual job vacancy has arisenon the island of St Helena, a British
overseas territory in the south Atlan-
tic, where touris m offi cials are seeking
a shortish “male person” willing to act
as France’s infamous emperor.
The post is unpaid and temporary.
The advertisement says candidates
are expected to be “well presented
and have the ability to engage with
individuals at all levels, especially
dignitaries” at events to mark the
anniversary of Napoleon’s death on
the volcanic outcrop in May 1821.
Bonaparte was exiled to St Helena
after the Battle of Waterloo. He arrived
there in October 1815.Napoleon needed:
St Helena posts ad
for impersonator
▼ Merrill Joshua, who used to hold
the role of Napoleon impersonator,
outside the emperor’s home in exile
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