WSJ Coast Guard pilot fired after Noem s blanket was left behind on plane

So, Josh, this is an incredible deep dive you did. Just to start with it, because it is so grabby, why did somebody get fired over a missing blanket? Yeah, my colleagues, Michelle Hackman and Tarini Pardee, and I wanted to understand exactly what was going on inside DHS with Kristi Noem. So we talked to dozens of people across the administration, inside, outside the government, and found a lot of startling anecdotes about how she managed. And the one you just asked about in particular, she was on a plane, they transferred to a different plane, and in the transfer, the blanket did not come with her. And then Corey Lewandowski ousted the pilot for not bringing the blanket alone to a second plane. And then they ended up having to reverse the decision, at least temporarily, because they realized they needed someone to fly the plane home. Well, that's remarkable. Why would they fire 80 percent of the career ICE officials or field staff? Don't they need them? Well, what we hear is that there is a lot of outbursts towards staff across the government, that they are very demanding, sometimes demands they say are coming from Trump, sometimes they're not. But folks who do not immediately jump to whatever they say in that moment are often summarily fired in seconds by the senior leadership of the agency, the cabinet secretary Mr. Lewandowski. And what we learned in sort of the course of this reporting was that across the White House and across many of the components of DHS, officials are incredibly frustrated at working with Secretary Nuland, Mr. Lewandowski, and they have described a very, very difficult work environment over the past little over a year. What is Lewandowski doing there? I thought he was a special government employee. So he was a special government employee. That means you get to work 130 days a year on a special project. In the first year of the presidency, the White House counsel and others began looking into this because they thought he was out of days, and he said he was not out of days. And there was a discovery that he sometimes was not swiping his badge in. But he recently was renewed for another stint as a special government employee because he's friends with the president. And White House advisers say the president still likes him, considers him loyal from the 2016 campaign, considers him sort of an OG Trumper, and does not want to get rid of him. So he has the president's blessing. And other frustrations aside, he keeps his stay in that role. But, you know, what's notable, Katie, is that most special government employees have a small window. They're working on one thing. They're in one topic. They're maybe doing something with the State Department or with the Defense Department or whatever. It's a specialized inquiry. Corey Ledofsky is running the Department of Homeland Security by all intents and purposes. He's the chief advisor to the secretary. He's managing contracts. He's firing people. The operational duties of that department are essentially being run by a special government employee. How is Noam faring at the White House? I know there's a lot of Republicans who are tired of her, especially after she claimed Alex Pretty was a domestic terrorist who was brandishing a gun. And was intent on killing law enforcement. She hasn't apologized for that. There was a lot of a lot of anger and frustration out there, bipartisan anger and frustration out there about her leadership and what she's done with DHS, what she's allowed. Does she still have the full support of the president? Well, as we reported in our piece, there's widespread frustration with her inside the White House. But there's one office that probably matters the most, and it's Oval. And in that office, the person who works behind the desk says that he still supports her and does not plan to fire her. He said that again today. He said that for our story through spokeswoman Caroline Levin. He sent a statement saying he supported her. Today, he was gaggling with reporters. He says he still supports her. So by all intents and purposes, he does still support her, even though many of his aides and advisors have been frustrated. But, you know, he watched the president for a long time, Katie. He supports someone until he doesn't. Sometimes so-and-so has a support, has a support, has a support, and then they're out. So I think at his word right now, he says he supports her and that's a company line. Yeah. And he's been acting a little bit differently, this administration, in terms of firing. One last question, and if we can do it quickly. I'm sorry I've run out of time, but you also are on byline reporting regarding the whistleblower case and Tulsi Gabbard. And there was reporting about who exactly the whistleblower report was about. Can you explain? I'm going to finish your one point, too, on firing. I mean, the president has told senior officials in the administration he does not want to fire cabinet secretaries this time. And he wished that he wouldn't have had to fire so many people in the first time. And that led to leaks and drama. And he doesn't want to give scalps to his critics, to the media. So I think that's one reason you see some survivals. OK, on to the whistleblower. We reported that the whistleblower complaint, as you reference there, was about Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law. Administration officials said that they do not believe the evidence is credible, that it was two, you know, folks talking who were foreigners about Mr. Kushner and that they don't believe it's credible. That said, there's a lot of criticism from Democrats and even, I think, some internally on why they did not turn the information over sooner. So right now, we don't know a lot about the report other than it's about Mr. Kushner and that the administration officials say they don't put much credence in it. Yeah, it reminds me back when Jared Kushner was trying to get a security clearance when he was working at the White House and he couldn't do it because of all of his foreign contacts, unless the president himself waived all the concerns and signed off on it. Josh Dossey, thanks so much for joining us. Always appreciate you coming on.