Homeland security awarded $250,000 contract to Trump-aligned consulting firm

The US Department of Homeland Security has awarded a $250,000 public relations contract to a Republican political consulting firm led by former Trump campaign officials with connections to Corey Lewandowski, a senior adviser to DHS secretary Kristi Noem, according to federal records reviewed by the Guardian.On 26 September 2025, DHS posted an opportunity for “public affairs consulting services”, specifying that the successful applicant would provide “strategic counsel” to top officials at the department including Noem. The work would also include ensuring that media outlets in “alignment with DHS priorities” were present at appearances with Noem, as well as drafting position papers and devising negotiation strategies “tailored to DHS’s priorities in border security, immigration enforcement, and cyber defense”.Bids were due the next day.In a departure from federal procurement guidelines, the description of the work posted by DHS also demanded partisan loyalty.“The contractor must demonstrate an established track record of promoting Trump administration policies in the media,” it stated. Preference would also be given to applicants “with prior experience in Cabinet-level communications, particularly those who served in a cabinet agency during the first Trump presidency”.Four days after the opportunity was made public, the contract was awarded to American Made Media Company (AMMC) LLC, a political consultancy formed in early 2025, merging several existing GOP-oriented political operations. The company, based in Arlington, Virginia, is led by veterans of Donald Trump’s presidential campaigns: Sean Dollman, deputy director of operations on the 2016 run and chief financial officer in both 2020 and 2024; Nick Trainer, a special assistant to Trump during the first administration and director of battleground strategy in 2020; and Justin Clark, deputy national political director in 2016 and deputy campaign manager in 2020. Clark also served in the first Trump administration as director at both the White House Office of Public Liaison and Office of Intergovernment Affairs.AMMC is an avowedly partisan, Republican firm with no apparent record of past government work. Its components include a data and polling agency, a direct mail operation and film production service, the latter having produced ads for the 2024 Trump campaign, former Trump personal physician turned Texas congressman Ronny Jackson and Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer. A similarly named shell company, American Made Media Consultants, was a conduit for $782m in Trump campaign spending in 2020, the Associated Press reported; that company was run by AMMC’s Dollman.Both of AMMC’s founding partners have previously worked alongside Lewandowski, who served as Trump’s campaign manager in 2016. Following the January 6 insurrection, CNN reported that Lewandowski and Clark were also part of the same small team of political advisers working with the then former president. Clark also served as Trump’s attorney, representing the president in litigation aimed at blocking Congress from obtaining White House records related to the 2021 attack on the US Capitol.Representatives for AMMC referred the Guardian to Tim Murtaugh, Trump’s 2020 communications director, who suggested he was the primary beneficiary of the award. “I have worked in a variety of capacities with AMMC over the years and I’m working on the DHS contract through them,” he said in a statement. DHS, he said, “naturally prefer to engage firms that already support the mission of the department and are familiar with the president’s record and agenda”.Murtaugh was brought on to the 2024 Trump campaign to work as a senior adviser, and his hiring was announced at the same time as Lewandowski’s. He did not respond when asked to characterize their relationship.Lewandowski, in his role as chief adviser to Noem, now reportedly wields significant control over contracts awarded by DHS.Last August, one month before AMMC was awarded its public affairs contract, Politico, citing a Trump administration official and two others at Fema, reported that Lewandowski “is involved in green-lighting six-figure contracts at the agency”.In February, the Wall Street Journal likewise reported that Lewandowski is “directing personnel and contracting”, noting that contracts worth more than $100,000 now must be approved by the office of the DHS secretary, a process that “has given Noem and Lewandowski an opportunity to play a bigger role in the department’s spending decisions than is typical for a secretary”. Several DHS officials told the outlet that “contracts and grants are being awarded in an opaque and arbitrary manner”.Scott Amey, general counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan watchdog group, said that the contract awarded to AMMC appears highly unusual – even unprecedented.“Talk about fast tracking, the bid was only open for 31 hours, and work began three days later. Speed often results in bad deals for the public,” Amey said. In addition, “the contract was advertised as pro-Trump firms only, which violates general contracting safeguards against bias and preferential treatment. While we know contracts are often steered to friendly companies, this is the first time I have seen such political bias in writing.”Under the regulation that governs procurement, federal agencies are required to conduct business “with complete impartiality and with preferential treatment for none”. The spending of public funds requires “the highest degree of public trust” and should “avoid strictly any conflict of interest or even the appearance of a conflict of interest”.Federal records show that a total of six bids were received on the contract, which is due to end on June 12, 2026.Jessica Tillipman, associate dean for government procurement law studies at George Washington University, told the Guardian that it’s not the first instance of public funds being steered to allies of those in government, but “it’s usually not so brazen.”“I’ve been doing this over 20 years. I have never seen something [like it],” she said, describing the partisan language as a “blazing red flag of procurement integrity concern”.“It’s usually considered an integrity red flag when it’s a very, very short turnaround time, because it means you typically have somebody in mind,” she said. “This openly says it needs to basically be a Trump-supportive entity, which I’ve just never, ever seen before.”In a statement, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said that DHS procurements “are overseen by the office of the chief procurement officer and are subject to applicable federal procurement laws and oversight, which ensure transparency, maximum competition and the prudent use of taxpayer funds.“It is not surprising that the Department of Homeland Security, which has proved to be an excellent steward of taxpayer dollars under the Trump administration, would requires [sic] any organization tasked with public affairs not only be proven to do the job but also be aligned with the agency’s mission,” she said.