Former TV personality Kari Lake, who has become a fixture in Donald Trump's orbit despite a track record of electoral failure, is actively searching for a new government position after being repeatedly passed over by the president and forced out of her previous role.
According to Vanity Fair, Lake was recently overheard at the aborted White House Correspondents' Dinner talking up her chances of landing an appointment to Trump's Shield of the Americas initiative — the same working group where former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem landed after being unceremoniously fired by the president.
Lake's job-hunting comes after a U.S. district judge ruled that she had been illegally installed as head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), declaring many of her actions illegitimate. Trump subsequently nominated State Department under secretary Sarah Rogers to replace her, though Lake initially insisted she would remain as "deputy CEO."
Even before being forced out of USAGM, Lake had been eyeing another position at an institution Trump was dismantling: the Kennedy Center. She began spending considerable time there after Trump's hostile takeover, showing up to Kennedy Center Honors events, Vanity Fair is reporting.
The report notes that, internally, it was suspected that Lake was attempting to replace Richard Grenell, the former ambassador whom Trump appointed to run the center despite his complete lack of arts experience. The center subsequently appointed Lisa Dale, Lake's best friend, to head up development.
As she continued her government job hunt, Lake was suspected of considering running for Senate; purchasing a house in her birth state of Iowa, stirring speculation about her political intentions. According to The Atlantic, Lake spent hours in the White House lobby waiting to meet with Trump, hoping to secure his endorsement for a congressional run — to no avail.
Sources familiar with Lake's situation suggest to Vanity Fair's Aidan McLaughlin that a position at Shield of the Americas is unlikely to materialize despite her entreaties. Trump's appointment of Kristi Noem to the same working group suggests it has become something of a "dumping ground for scandal-plagued loyalists" the president isn't quite ready to fully cast out from his inner circle, McLaughlin wrote.