As health care workers in the U.S. scrambled to improvise desperately needed safety gear, Jared Kushner recruited inexperienced volunteers to lead the hunt for supplies.
Records show many of them were told to prioritize tips from allies of President Trump.nyti.ms/3dohaBG
Records show many of them were told to prioritize tips from allies of President Trump.nyti.ms/3dohaBG
The young volunteers were drawn from venture capital and private equity firms and had little to no experience with government procurement procedures or medical equipment. They were put in charge of sifting through over a thousand incoming leads on supplies.
Tips from President Trump's associates were tracked on a "VIP Update" spreadsheet, according to documents we obtained. Among them were leads from Republican Congress members, Charlie Kirk and a former “Apprentice” contestant who now runs Women For Trump. nyti.ms/3dohaBG 
Few of the leads, VIP or otherwise, panned out, according to a whistle-blower memo written by one volunteer and sent to the House Oversight Committee: "It was bureaucratic cycles of chaos." nyti.ms/3dohaBG
"There’s an old saying in emergency management — disaster is the wrong time to exchange business cards," a former deputy administrator at FEMA said. "And it’s absolutely the wrong time to make up new procedures." nyti.ms/3dohaBG
The search for new supplies ultimately became a case study in Trump's style of governing, in which personal relationships and loyalty are often prized over governmental expertise, and private interests are granted extraordinary access and deference.
nyti.ms/3dohaBG
nyti.ms/3dohaBG
