Senior adviser rejects rumors of shake-up in Trump campaign leadership

Trump campaign senior official Corey Lewandowski has rejected rumors of shake-up in the management of the former president’s election bid, saying the operation’s leadership will not change.

Lewandowski, Trump’s 2016 campaign manager who recently joined the 2024 team, told Fox News Sunday that campaign managers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita will remain at the top.

“We are solely focused on one thing, which is making sure Donald Trump has the opportunity to lay out his vision for America over the next nine weeks,” Lewandowski said.

Lewandowski, a controversial figure who was fired by Trump in 2016 after grabbing the arm of a reporter and four years later lost his position overseeing a pro-Trump political fund amid claims he made unwanted sexual advances on a Trump donor, was re-admitted to the campaign last month.

That prompted speculation that Lewandowski would be appointed campaign chairperson as Trump’s polling began to slip against a reformulated Democratic party operation with a new candidate. Some reports asserted that Trump had “been feeling superstitious and nostalgic of late”.

But rising speculation that Wiles and LaCivita might be pushed aside in favor of Lewandowski and former presidential counsellor Kellyanne Conway have not materialized into a campaign shake-up.

Related: Top Trump advisers in turmoil after campaign’s worst month of 2024

A Trump campaign statement last month said that Trump “thinks Ms Wiles and Mr LaCivita are doing a phenomenal job and any rumors to the contrary are false and not rooted in reality”.

An ABC News/Ipsos poll released on Sunday showed Kamala Harris with a four-point lead over Trump among registered voters 50%-46%, and a six-point advantage among likely voters, 52%-46%.

But neither Trump nor Harris appeared to get a boost from their respective party’s conventions. However, more voters were also willing to say Harris is “too liberal” to be president (46%) than indicate Trump is “too conservative” (43%).

“The race between them remains close, with no overall bounce in support for Harris out of her nominating convention,” said Gary Langer, president of Langer Research Associates, which conducted the survey.