Trump's Campaign Firm Is Cashing In on the Admin's Ads Praising Him

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11 hours ago

Donald Trump's top campaign firm has quietly handled the administration's television advertisements thanking the president for closing the border and locking up criminals, according to a Rolling Stone review.
Strategic Media Services Inc. does not appear in any publicly available records regarding the Department of Homeland Security's controversial $200 million ad campaign. However, the ad buying firm — which was the single-biggest vendor for Trump's 2024 campaign — is the only company that's been associated with DHS' ads in filings with the Federal Communications Commission since the department announced the ads in February.
A DHS spokesperson denies knowing anything about Strategic Media Services, and says the firm isn't one of the department's vendors. 'DHS doesn't have control of subcontractors and cannot tell a vendor who or who not to hire,' they add. Strategic Media Services did not respond to outreach from Rolling Stone.
The Trump administration has faced scrutiny over its profligate, political-style ad campaign, in which Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem repeatedly thanks the president while attempting to scare immigrants into leaving the United States or never coming here at all. The ad campaign is one of many ways that Trump and his administration are marshaling vast public resources to make the president feel good about himself.
In one set of ads, Noem thanks Trump for 'securing our border and putting America first,' while telling undocumented immigrants: 'We will find you and deport you.' In another, she credits 'President Trump's leadership' for her Department of Homeland Security having caught several people accused of heinous crimes.
A Trump White House official says that 'it is normal for an agency head to thank their principal — in this instance the president of the United States — for their policies and leadership.'
While Trump has purged the federal workforce and slashed government programs in the name of eliminating waste and abuse, his administration determined there to be such 'an unusual and compelling urgency' for this $200 million ad campaign that officials selected two Republican firms to work on the ads without a competitive bidding process.
One of the firms, called People Who Think, has ties to former top Trump adviser Corey Lewandowski, a longtime Noem confidant who is reportedly acting as her 'gatekeeper' at DHS. (They have both denied reports that they had an affair.) The second vendor, Safe America Media, is a newly created shell company operating at the home of GOP consultant Mike McElwain.
Rolling Stone attempted to call McElwain for this story, but the man who picked up immediately hung up the phone and did not respond to texts. People Who Think did not respond to a request for comment.
Officials specifically exempted the DHS ads from review by Elon Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency. The DHS briefly attempted to fund these ads with money from its Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, an oversight office the administration has tried to gut, but backtracked after Rolling Stone reported on the maneuver.
The involvement of Strategic Media Services, the Trump campaign's ad buyer, has not been disclosed in government procurement files or spending data.
Trump's campaign committee disclosed paying $270 million to Strategic Media Services during the 2024 election — or more than half of what the campaign raised, according to federal election records. Most of the spending went toward ad placements.
Dozens of FCC records show the firm buying TV time for DHS ads in recent months. The firm's buys can be traced to a 30-second version of the ad in which Noem starts: 'Thank you, President Donald J. Trump, for securing our border and putting America first.'
Strategic Media Services also apparently placed an ad in which Noem says: 'An accused rapist, murderer and child pornographer. All illegal aliens caught because of President Trump's leadership.' Noem pledges in that ad that 'if you're here illegally, you will be fined nearly $1,000 a day, imprisoned, and deported,' as video plays showing her touring CECOT — the notorious mega-prison in El Salvador where Trump shipped hundreds of immigrants without due process, in open defiance of a judge's order.
After encouraging immigrants to self-deport, Noem concludes: 'Under President Trump, America will be protected.'
So far, DHS has disclosed spending roughly $77 million on the ads, federal records show.
Tony Carrk, executive director at the watchdog Accountable.US, tells Rolling Stone, 'President Trump and his allies in Congress say they have no choice but to rip away health care and basic food aid from millions of working people and seniors. Yet there's somehow plenty of money for more Trump tax breaks for his billionaire donors and for an overtly political taxpayer-funded vanity project to repair Kristi Noem's image after her many scandals. That's the Trump administration in a nutshell: There's always enough taxpayer money to promote their brands or enrich themselves and wealthy insiders — but no money left to help everyday Americans get ahead.'
In a budget hearing in May, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) pressed Noem on the way her department is using the public's money, including her spending '$200 million for an ad campaign fawning over President Trump's supposed accomplishments.'
'You're just spending recklessly and it would seem wastefully, without authorization,' Blumenthal said. 'That's against the law.'
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