Trump confidant Natalie Harp: $45,000 for Christmas

She is young, blonde and is one of US President Donald Trump's closest confidants. Natalie Harp has achieved something that many heads of state and government regularly fail to do - she has built a close, trusting relationship with the president. She is expected to work seven days a week, often late into the night. She hardly ever speaks and yet is always present. And now it has been revealed that she received a one-time payment of $45,000 from Trump as a Christmas present. Other White House employees also received cash gifts.

A lawyer told the Washington Post on Wednesday that the gifts may have violated applicable law because government employees' salaries cannot be topped up with extra payments. The White House press office said the payment was unrelated to Harp's duties.

Interest in Harp, who feeds the president important information, exploded a few weeks ago when it was announced that she was one of the lucky few to be placed in an airplane catering container with the president. This was necessary in order to secretly fly Trump and his staff out of Turkey in view of an impending attack by Iran. However, other top government officials such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio remained on the plane.

This led to the question: Who is the woman who was saved from a possible attack by Trump? Your job in the White House is to provide the president with content and important information - that is, to convey to him what the world outside Washington thinks about him.

According to insiders, her nickname is "the human printer" because she follows the president around with a portable printer so that she can give him information in printed form. According to New York Times journalists Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, Trump said that Harp was the only one who would love him as much as his wife and children do. All of his other employees would eventually leave to make money - that's how Trump put it - but Harp would never leave. However, the capital's press also agrees that the two cannot be said to have a sexual relationship.

Harp, 35, grew up in a religious family in California. Her older brother and she were homeschooled by their mother. She then attended two religious universities. But her connection to Trump goes beyond politics and work.

Because Trump saved her life, says Harp. When she developed bone cancer almost ten years ago, it was a law signed by Trump in 2018 that gave her access to experimental treatments. These treatments saved her, she explained in 2019.

She then worked for a few years as a news anchor for the ultra-right-wing network One America News. There she promoted the lie of the “stolen election” of 2020. According to her, Trump is the rightful winner of the US presidential election six years ago. It is a claim that Trump regularly repeats to this day. There is still no evidence to support this.

How big the influence of Harp, who has been working for Trump since 2022, really is: Nobody knows. But her access to the president appears almost unrestricted.