YouSaid · the spoken record

Corey Lewandowski

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110
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2017-02-20
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2017-02-20
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  1. Here's the unique thing about that particular day. There were probably three hundred potential media there that day in the lobby, listening to it. Not one media outlet following that speech was up in arms. And what we did immediately following that speech is we got on the airplane, we flew to Iowa, where Donald Trump gave almost the exact same speech that night at Hoyt chairman in Des Moines. And then the next day, we went up to New Hampshire, gave the almost the exact same speech. So that would have been Tuesday night and Wednesday, no media outroar at all. What happened, unfortunately then, there was a terrible tragedy in South Carolina. A crazy person walked into an African-American church and killed a bunch of people.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. Threw right out the window Well, we distribute it to the media like most good campaigns would and said, here are the prepared remarks, and one outlet ran it, of course, before they did any due diligence. And then he threw it out the window and he went off on his own

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. And it was just me, him, and his wife, Melania Trump, there. And he said, Are you ready for this? And I said, Yes, sir, I am. And he just took this deep breath and exhaled. He said, let's go. And that was it.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. And we delivered it to Mr. Trump on that Sunday. He read it and I said, you have any questions? No, all set. Great. So Tuesday, look, I had the very high privilege. Just before he announced he was going to run for President of the United States. Everybody was gathered downstairs. And as the campaign manager, I went up to his office. In the lobby. In the lobby, and I had the privilege of going up to the 26th floor of Trump Tower in his office. And everybody else was already downstairs, his entire family.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. Determining those factors. I mean, look, I was involved in that. But myself and Georgia Gicos, who's the director of Advance for the White House, we huddled ourselves in the Sheridan in Midtown, New York, and I wrote what was supposed to be his announcement speech, like any good staffer would. And I went through a dozen iterations of it and had every word down. And I said, you know, Mr. Trump, this is going to be about seven minutes and 45 seconds is about how long this is supposed to go for.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. So on, we originally want to announce on June 14th, which happens to be Flag Day. It also happens to be the President's birthday. But it fell on a Sunday. And I knew I didn't want to do it on a Sunday. I knew I was doing it on a Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday. And so we spent about six weeks planning this announcement meticulously from the color of the credentials that we would issue to each person to the meeting.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. It did. It did. And so, you know, I signed up and he said, okay, you start with me tomorrow? And I said, well, I've got a job and ended up. The first event we did was in South Carolina, and I wasn't sure if people were coming out to see him because he was a celebrity or because we were going to run for president. Can we methodically over the next four or five months built what we thought were the bones of a presidential campaign?

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. Because it said that if you want to terminate my relationship, you have to pay me for the length of my contract. Which is how normal people do business.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. And I said, you know what? Let's try something different. Just take a chance. And look, it became a bone of contention later after I was asked to leave the campaign. But I signed a contract. And so look, if I'm going to work for you, I want to have a contract because if you fire me tomorrow, became a bonus.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. So he hired me on the spot. I stood up. I remember very clearly, walked out of his office. I called my wife and I said, I think I just took a new job. She said, doing what? I said, I'm not sure. And I drove back from New Hampshire. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, look, I had been working for the Coax, and they're not running out of money anytime soon, okay? They were doing just fine when Americans' prosperity was doing well and is doing well.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. He started high, right? And look, I walked away thinking I had the benefit, and he walked away thinking he had the benefit. And he shook my hand and he said, okay, you're hired.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. And we started talking. We're about 30 minutes into the conversation. He said to me, do you want to run my campaign for president? He said, what do you think the odds of me running and winning are? And I said, you know, sir, with all due respect, 5%. And he said, I think they're 10%. And I said, well, let's compromise 7.5%. And he said, done.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. I said, you know, I borrowed a car. I rented a car to get here, which is a pretty nice one. Zip car, I think it's called. It was $19.99 a day. So, you know, it was fine.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. And ended up the day before I was supposed to go to New York, Dave called me and said, hey, Corey, something came up. I can't be there tomorrow. But can you go anyways? I said, sure. What am I going for? He goes, I just go see Mr. Trump. It'll be fine. So I drove to New York and waited, long story short, I ended up in his office and he stood up. He shook my hand. We started talking. He started telling me about his Air Force, meaning his helicopters and airplanes and all the things that he had. And then he told me he was going to have.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. Courtes And then I fast forward to November of 2014 after the election. Stave Bossi called me up again and Dave and I have a good relationship, a strong relationship. And he said, hey, I've got to go to New York in January to go see Mr. Trump. Would you come with me? I said, sure. What are we going for? He goes, I've got to go see him. Come with me. We'll meet New York. I said, of course. Who wouldn't want to go see Donald Trump in New York?

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. Nobody else offered their helicopter. Nobody. I mean, Rubio, Cruz, nobody. I mean, and so I just was very kind of them. And following that interaction with him, I sent him a nice thank you note, of course, as just a matter of.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. And I said, Well, what do you want to do? And she just shook her head and she said, no. And I said, you know, that's okay. You don't have to go. But I thought it was so kind to go out of his way. He didn't have to do that.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. Adieu and she was the oldest so she wanted to come and she said Hey daddy I said yeah she said the man over there offered me a ride in his helicopter what do you think?

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. And he just went on and he gave a speech and we're tough. It was my first interaction with him though. And the thing that was most striking to me was I had my young daughter with me who's, she's 10 now, so she's about seven at the time. And she's in the back room in the green room

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. And look, I run a very tight ship. We knew we were going to start exactly on time and end on time. It was going to start at 8 a.m. It's going to end at 4 p.m. wasn't going any longer. And I had it mapped out minute by minute. And I think each candidate was given like nine minutes to speak and we had a big clock. And Mr. Trump came up and we had a number of people that Marshall Blackburn was a bunch of others. And we were going to have a lunch break scheduled so people would get up and walk around. And we scheduled him right before the lunch break. And he was supposed to have nine minutes. Well, he spoke through the entire lunch period for 45 minutes with the flashing stop talking sign.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. But look, when you've got eight or nine potential presidential candidates in a room, you're going to have a drawer anyway. C Span's going to cover it live. It's the first in the nation. We're spoiled in New Hampshire, so we're used to this. And we had the biggest room we could get.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. The two organizations. So, Citizen United, Americans prosperly host an event and invite as many potential presidential candidates to New Hampshire to address the crowd, right? Good earned media opportunity for anybody. And Marco Rubio came, Ted Cruz came, Mike Lee came. And Dave said to me, let's invite Donald Trump. I said, Dave, he's not going to run. Like, I don't want, you know, just let's not do this. He says, no, let's invite him. I said, okay. So Mr. Trump flew up on his helicopter from New York. Because.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. Like everybody else, you probably. I was still working for Americans of Prosperity, and it was April of 2014. What happened was Dave Bossy, who was the president of Cis and United, and I decided that we were going to jointly have an event and invite potential presidential candidates up to New Hampshire.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. Could make a difference. So I think the state needs to address that. They've tried to do some of that with voter ID and saying, look, if you want to cast a provisional ballot, if you don't live in the state and don't have a recognized driver's license from the state, you can cast a provisional ballot. But when you go back and verify by mailing you a piece of mail at that address before we count your vote, I think that's a fair thing for the state to do.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. I live on the border. I didn't see buses coming across the line to say that, hey, we've moved up from Massachusetts and candidly. Most of the people actually move in from Massachusetts move into the southern tier of the state of New Hampshire. That happens to be the most conservative area of the state in the Rockingham and Hillsborough County are right along that border. So I don't think you have that. But what I do think you have is you have the potential in the future for voter fraud. And the important part here, David, is you have to remember with 400 state representatives in the state of New Hampshire, literally one or two votes in these districts where they only represent 3,300 people.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. That didn't happen. That's not what happens. But the law in New Hampshire is very unique and needs to be changed because the law stipulates in the state of New Hampshire, if it is your frame of mind on election day, that you are a New Hampshire resident, then you're entitled to vote there. That means you could be there for one day, one week, one month, one year. And I think the problem with that, the way that the Attorney General of the State of New Hampshire has read this law, is that it's so broad that it has the potential for voter fraud because people could come in that day if they so chose and say, hey, look, you know what? I've got a business here or I feel like I'm a Hampshire resident because I've always been here. Guess what? I'm going to vote in the elections.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. The difference with the model is if you don't raise money from within your state and you can't get buy-in from the people who are actually impacted by the legislation that you're trying to change, the model fails. And that's a good thing. So it was important to get the people from the state of New Hampshire to say, look, this is something we want and you're creating value. So we didn't engage in races. We didn't engage with candidates who are either running for the U.S. Senate or congressional or down ballot races. We didn't do any of that. We just focus on statehouse legislative activities. We looked at issues like right to work. Can New Hampshire become a right to work? It's still a fight that's going on to this day. For us, it was something where we saw some early success, but didn't get a lot of buying. Then when we started to really grow was when the Republicans took over the State House and we knew that we could help move an agenda which was going to be pro-economic freedom. And that's where AFP really.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. The model is very different, and I can tell you when I launch the chapter on the State House Steps in Concord, New Hampshire, literally seven people showed up. My wife was one of them, our infant daughter was the other, and then five friends. And that's all it was. And it was to the fanfare of exactly nobody. Nobody cared. Nobody wanted it. It was just going to be another group they thought.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. Then, after three or four years of doing that, they promoted me and I oversaw a fairly large region of the country on their behalf. And then ultimately went on to run their voter registration and get out the vote activities on a nationwide basis. And it was based on the book, The Victory Lab, Sasha Eisenberg's book.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. It was amazing. I had the privilege of taking my wife and I think maybe my daughter at the time on one of a vacation. And we were down in Aruba and I had this phone call from this person I'd never heard of. He says, hey, this is Tim Phillips, and I'm with Americans Prosperity, and we'd like to hire you to run New Hampshire. So I have no idea who you are, what the organization is, but I'm on vacation with my family. And if you want to talk to me, I'll be back in two weeks. And lo and behold, he actually called. And I kind of came on board to give some advice and counsel because I had done a U.S. Senate race in New Hampshire. And they said, look, New Hampshire seems to be the type of place where smaller government in general would be a good message there. And so I spent some time building a chapter, launching the chapter, building it, trying to pass bills at the state legislative level that would reduce the burden of taxes on people, give people more economic freedom, and built that to some level of success. I'm not sure how much, but...

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. Which is very exciting spending time in Trenton. At the time there were no hotels in Trenton, so I got to drive back and forth to Princeton, which is fine. But then I left there and joined an organization called Americans of Prosperity, American Prosperity Foundation.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. Yeah, I went up and first I took a job at the Republican National Committee to be the Northeast Legislative Political Director and help some races there worked in the New Jersey Governor's race, which is an off-year election up there way back a million years ago with Jim McGreevy and those guys. Those are the races we were doing at the time. But then I went to a 501c4 against me.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. That's exactly right. And what I didn't know at the time, what I've learned since is a number of people do this on a fairly regular basis. This is something because they come from other areas. They think that they need a weapon.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. For crimes that honestly, you know, I understand like a crime is a crime, but there are different levels. You know, commuting a felony is very different than not.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. Where I ask you any further questions. No, no, you're fine. But, you know what it is? Sure, you have to be cognizant all the time. But more importantly, I think the real issue is... In an instant, someone's life can change, and sometimes you don't plan on it. And that was a big change for me going and having to go through that. And look, I was very fortunate I had a boss that understood that it was clearly a mistake and he didn't fire me, which I thought was very kind of him. I offered to resign, of course. But he said, no, I'm going to stand by.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  36. Oh sure, look, you get into a situation like that. It reminds you just how Important freedom is, right? How you go from doing what you think you can do from one day to the next and all of a sudden your life is not your own.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  37. Having freedom, they're not having freedom in a matter of seconds. And I went down and I was processing the DC facility. And look, as much as I grew up in a tough town, it's a whole different ballgame when you walk in to a situation like that. And you really have no freedom. And I waited hours to have the judge call me and then release me my own recognizance. And then I had to hire an attorney and do all the things that people do. And ultimately, I was found that there was no intent, obviously. And even the police officers, because they're professionals, said, look, clearly I did not know it was in the bag by my expression, by my demeanor. And they came and testified to that. And the congressman said, look, obviously there was no intention here of any harm, which of course there wasn't. But it was a like me.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  38. No, it wasn't that. It was, you know, I'm a big supporter of the Second Amendment. And when I was in Ohio, something that we'd go out and shoot a lot. And this wasn't anything more than that. And it wasn't nefarious in any way. But I'll tell you, it's very humbling when you go from...

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  39. Oh, yeah, no, right there. They said, look, we've got to process you. And that's what they do. That's what the capital police are there to do.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  40. It was So, you know what happened was I had a license to carry concealed weapon in the state of Ohio and I had it in a bag, a laundry bag that I would travel back and forth with. And the night before, usually what would happen was I would drive the member's car. It would have member of Congress place because I would drive him to and from Ohio every week and never really thought about it for whatever reason and didn't really bring the car into the capital very often other than maybe on the outside to pick him up very quickly. And what happened that particular day was I had my bag at my home in Virginia and went into the capital the same way I would normally do but I brought the bag with me and I walked through the Longworth building and I put my bag on the magnetom and through the x-ray machine like everybody else and I walked through and the officer said to me can you step through sir? And I said, of course. So I stepped through and he says, is this your bag? Of course it is. What's in it? And it was literally, if you ever saw the pictures, it was just overloaded with dirty laundry. I was going to bring back to Ohio and goat. And he says, I think you've got something in the bag.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  41. Bob grew up in a tough area of Ohio, southeastern Ohio was a cold country and the steel industry that had been decimated and I think sometimes people forget like, hey, you know what? People back home when you're making $150,000 a year as a congressman and the guy back home is making $30,000 a year and you're taking the free meals and the free trips, you know, those are things that I think get members of Congress in trouble and he's not the only one.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  42. Bob's a very good man. He was very good to me and took very good care of me, and I mean that in the best sense when I was a young guy moving to Ohio and didn't have any family out there. But what happens, I think, and this is not just on Bob, is people come to Washington and they get staffs and they get cars and they get offices and everyone tells them how great they are and they forget the rules sometimes.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  43. Ohio. I went out to work on Congressman Nay's campaign in 98 and ran his reelect in 98 and 2000. Bob Nay from Ohio where I had a different look at politics there. Politics in Ohio are very different than they are in Massachusetts. Bob won and he went on to become the chairman, the mayor, they call him the mayor of Capitol Hill, the chairman of the House Administration Committee and I left. That wasn't for me.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  44. I did I did. So they have this thing at the end of when you're finishing your master's degree. They actually time you and you had to sit there and answer a series of questions. You had to memorize all these authors. And it was just lucky it was a disaster. Somehow they passed me. I think they just wanted me to get me out of school, a school of public affairs down in Washington, American University. And look, I was so lucky. I was a first person in my entire extended family ever to go to graduate school. And so it was a big deal. It was a really big deal. But I passed, probably by the grace of God, and worked on Capitol Hill for a little while, and then decided to go out and really want to campaign.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  45. And Met, these aren't the ultra-conservative right wing of a party. And that's where I grew up. I grew up with fiscal responsibility. And a lot of that was held at the State House by Democrats and Republicans. That's why I think for a period of time Bill Weld had a pretty good run as the governor of Massachusetts because he could work across party lines to agree on fiscal responsible things. And to me, that's the most important thing. The other stuff is important, but it's not as important.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  46. Which is always helpful. It always helps when your opponent gets indicted. But look, even Massachusetts Republicans who go back and look at the days of Bill Weldon, Paul Salucci, and Jane Swift, the Republican governors of the time.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  47. Very moderate took the seat from Nick Marvulus, who happened to get indicted going into that election the first time Peter won in 92.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  48. Well, yeah, I mean, she was ultimately fired and probably never had another job in politics again, but It instilled in me something that good

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  49. Well, he disappeared basically, right? I mean, that's what happened, right? I mean, Peter Torkelson lost his reelection campaign.

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  50. I went to, I interned for what was the last Republican from Massachusetts. His name was Peter Torkelson in Congress in 1996. And I interned for him. And Peter lost his reelection campaign in 1996 by about 361 votes. And what I remember the most is the congressional staff took a leave of absence starting on Halloween night before the election, so four or five days before the election, drove up to Massachusetts to help campaign. And we get up there and the campaign manager who I'd never met said, look, race is over. We're going to win. Feel free to go home. Go enjoy yourself. Go spend time with your family, your friends, go out with your buddies. I say, what do I know, right? Sure, I'll go do that, and we probably hit the bars or do whatever we did. And we woke up four or five days later and we lost by 360. What happened to that guy?

    2017-02-20 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 123 - Corey Lewandowski · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source