MAGAworld was founded by a man who flung himself into pop culture and political relevance via reality TV.
Plagued by the scarlet letter of ties to former President Trump, several of the TV president’s past allies and White House staffers have had trouble finding work post-presidency — some have even faced professional repercussions, like, I don’t know, losing their license to practice law.
Jobless and defeated, why not follow in The Apprentice star’s footsteps?
Rudy Giuliani appears to be the latest Trumpworld figure to fall down the reality TV rabbit hole — and to take heat for it.
On Wednesday night, news broke of Giuliani’s upcoming appearance in the first Season 7 episode of the popular game show “The Masked Singer,” in which fully costumed celebrity contestants sing parts of famous songs before unmasking their true identity.
The unmasking of Giuliani — who is among the most polarizing Trumpworld figures for being one of the most active proponents of Trump’s Big Lie — not only stunned judges, but reportedly prompted two of them (Robin Thicke and Ken Jeong) to walk out, according to Deadline.
And Giuliani isn’t the only Trumpworld figure to have made a controversial cameo on reality TV, either.
There was former White House press secretary Sean Spicer’s stint on “Dancing with the Stars” in 2019 that drew heaps of criticism. At the time, critics argued that Spicer’s appearance on the celebrity dance competition helped his efforts to rehabilitate his reputation after being dishonest with the American public during his time in the Trump administration.
Spicer sealed his reputation as a liar during his first day on the job, when he infamously bragged that Trump’s swear-in drew “the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period. Both in person and around the globe.” Photographic evidence of Trump’s 2017 inauguration showed otherwise — the crowd was significantly smaller than former President Obama’s inauguration in 2009. Spicer eventually walked back the bogus line by instead claiming that Trump’s inauguration was the biggest when in-person, streaming and television audiences were combined.
The pivot from disgraced ex-Trump administration official to reality TV infamy didn’t stop with Spicer. A couple of former Trump aides also landed gigs on “Celebrity Big Brother.” Namely, former Trump White House aide Omarosa Manigault-Newman and communications director Anthony Scaramucci.
Manigault-Newman, who is also an alum of Trump’s “The Apprentice,” resigned from her position in the White House months before debuting on “Celebrity Big Brother.” She was reportedly escorted out of the White House by Secret Service following her resignation.
On the show, Manigault-Newman was seen dishing many of her thoughts about the time she served in the Trump administration.
“It’s so bad,” she said through tears to fellow cast member Ross Mathews in a video posted by the reality TV show in 2018.
“I felt like it was a call to duty, I felt like I was serving my country, not serving him,” Manigault Newman said after Mathews said that as a voter “I never got” why she served in the White House. “I was haunted by tweets every single day, like what’s he going to tweet next?”
Then there was Scaramucci — the former White House communications director who notoriously served in the Trump administration for a mere 10 days.
But his appearance on “Celebrity Big Brother” was even shorter than his time in the Trump White House — in fact, it was only six days into filming the show that he got the boot.
Much like Manigault-Newman, Scaramucci also vented about Trump’s chronic tweeting.
“Let’s face it, I’m not a fan on the president’s war on the media or the non-strategic use of his Twitter feed,” Scaramucci said to the camera. “Having said that, he’s going to continue to that anyway. He’s never tweeted at me. One, I stay loyal to him, I don’t really say bad things about him. I’ll tell him to knock it off on Twitter, but I still want to help him. But if he turned on me, he knows I’ve got a big mouth. That’s not going to be great for him.”
And although talk of her entering the reality TV world ultimately didn’t come to fruition, longtime Trump aide Hope Hicks was recently rumored to be joining the cast of “Celebrity Big Brother.” The rumor, which was circulated by a gossip Twitter account, has since been debunked.
Trumpworld figures carrying on the legacy of the former president beyond their time serving in the administration shouldn’t come as a surprise.
In fact, it’s woven into the DNA of earning Trumpy favors. There’s Manigault-Newman’s stint on “The Apprentice” that eventually led to her time in the White House. Additionally, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) — who briefly appeared on “The Celebrity Apprentice” before entering prison in 2012 for selling the Senate seat of then-President-elect Barack Obama, among other charges — had his sentence commuted by Trump in 2020.
Although Trump had to leave behind “The Apprentice” upon entering office, it seems that the former president’s days in the reality TV world may not be numbered after all.
Despite his refusal to concede the 2020 presidential election and talk of running again in 2024, Trump reportedly still has reality TV on the brain. Just before leaving office, he floated to confidants the idea of resurrecting “The Apprentice” or “The Celebrity Apprentice,” The Daily Beast reported in Dec. 2020.
