The Untold Truth Of Omarosa
As the fiery villain on the very first season of NBC's The Apprentice, Omarosé Onée Manigault-Newman, aka Omarosa, rose to reality TV star fame in 2004, which was apparently all the credentials she needed to join Donald Trump's presidential campaign and White House administration. However, thanks to her bold personality and questionable relationship with the truth, Omarosa has been a controversial media figure. But what most people don't know is that Omarosa actually started her career in politics. Except it wasn't exactly the most illustrious, or lengthy, career, and even back then, Omarosa was making enemies. This is her untold truth.
She used to work for Al Gore
When Omarosa joined Donald Trump's political campaign, the move raised more than a few eyebrows considering the majority of her professional experience seemed to lie in reality television. However, Omarosa actually worked for the Clinton administration, but as People discovered, her brief tenure did not go well.
According to former staffers, when Omarosa wasn't neglecting her job duties, she was causing drama with her co-workers to the point where one woman "wanted to slug her." Her disruptive presence resulted in her being "banished" from four different positions in just under two years. However, in 2004, after finding fame on The Apprentice, Omarosa told a panel discussion that she performed "logistics and advance and event planning" for Al Gore. Which isn't exactly true. Her actual title was "scheduling correspondent," and her job was to simply respond to invitations. It was one of Omarosa's brief positions, and she was quickly transferred out of it.
Despite People blowing the lid on her time in the Clinton administration, that hasn't stopped Omarosa from embellishing her credentials. While working for Trump's campaign in 2016, Omarosa told Frontline that she worked on Gore's staff as the "deputy associate director of presidential personnel." We may never know what she actually did.
She talked smack about Apprentice winner Bill Rancic
Even though Omarosa has never won The Apprentice, there is a solid case to be made that she was the breakout star of the first season, and that viewers mainly tuned in to see what the show's "villain" would do next. And no one is more aware of that fact than Omarosa. In an interview with TV Guide, she lashed out at Apprentice winner Bill Rancic who questioned how Omarosa made an appearance at the 2004 Emmy Awards even though she wasn't invited.
"He's fighting for attention on the red carpet because I'm dominating the reporters and photographers," Omarosa said, but she was far from finished. "Let's face it. I'm on more red carpets than Bill Rancic and I'm in more demand than he is. The show wasn't a hit because he's the Apprentice."
And she kept going. "Nobody's saying, 'Who's the next Bill Rancic? When's Bill Rancic coming back?' His name isn't on the cover of TV Guide. It had my name on it. It's sad because if I was the Apprentice and there was another contestant grabbing the limelight from me, I would be angry, too. Too bad!"
She walked out of an interview with Jimmy Kimmel
During the first season of The Apprentice, Omarosa accused contestant Ereka Vetrini of calling her "the n-word," which Vetrini and producers adamantly denied. Vetrini even went so far as to take a lie detector test on The Howard Stern Show, which she "passed with flying colors," according to Reality TV World. When asked about Vetrini's lie detector results during an interview with Extra, Omarosa stopped answering questions and walked off. But she wasn't finished with dramatic exits.
A little over a week later, Omarosa was scheduled to appear on Jimmy Kimmel Live! But when she arrived on set, she saw a lie detector and assumed it would be used on her to learn the truth about her accusation against Vetrini. Allegedly, the lie detector was for an Uncle Frank sketch that had absolutely nothing to do with Omarosa, but she became "combative" with producers. Eventually, a compromise was close to being reached that involved the lie detector being quickly whisked off stage before Omarosa even stepped on camera, but at the last minute, she stormed off set and never returned.
La Toya Jackson accused her of murdering Michael Clarke Duncan
On September 3, 2012, actor Michael Clarke Duncan died after suffering a heart attack in July that left him hospitalized. At the time, he was engaged to Omarosa who reportedly performed CPR and called 911 after resuscitating him. Duncan's death was nothing short of a tragedy, but it quickly exploded into a scandal for Omarosa as his family demanded an investigation into changes made to his will that significantly benefited the Apprentice star, according to TMZ.
It also didn't help that Omarosa went to work filming The Celebrity Apprentice a month after Duncan's death, and those circumstances led to an explosive situation. After being "fired" from the show in March 2013, La Toya Jackson accused Omarosa of not only giving Duncan a heart attack, but also of "pulling the plug" on the late actor. In fairness, Jackson later took back her inflammatory comments, but that didn't stop Omarosa from announcing a lawsuit on The Howard Stern Show.
However, according to E! News, Jackson's reps said they were unaware of any litigation, while Omarosa's team said they spoke with Jackson's lawyers who blamed the whole thing on Apprentice producers. If a lawsuit was filed, there's no existing record.
She became an ordained minister
Despite her reputation as a lightning rod for drama, in 2014, Omarosa made a surprise announcement on Oprah: Where They Are Now (via HuffPost). The Apprentice star had secretly become an ordained Baptist minister two years earlier after enrolling in seminary full-time. According to Omarosa, she was doing missionary work in West Africa when she looked into the eyes of a child dying from HIV/AIDS and received her call to ministry. Naturally, there were a few detractors who weighed in on Omarosa's newfound spiritual path.
"There were people who felt like because I had done this show ages ago, that maybe that disqualified me from the ministry," she says. "I mean, I got tons and tons of support from around the world, but, boy, did I hear from the critics."
"They underestimate the power of God's ability to transform a person's life," she added. "In the blink of an eye, God can come into your situation and turn your life around."
She became Trump's director of African-American outreach
During Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, Omarosa was questionably appointed as his director of African-American outreach, which according to Vox, did not go well considering Hillary Clinton had an 800-oint advantage over Trump with black voters. Yikes. Also, Trump had one of the more controversial presidential campaigns in recent history when it comes to race relations, according to PBS, so it's hard to see where Omarosa had a positive impact. But it's not that difficult to see where she had a negative one.
In June 2016, People reported that Omarosa invited members of the Congressional Black Caucus to meet with Trump. Except Omarosa angered members by signing her name on the invitation as "The Honorable Omarosa Manigault." While CBC members have the right to "The Honorable" title due to their elected positions, Omarosa had no claim to it, yet used it anyway. It was another setback in the campaign's attempts to bridge racial divides, which were becoming par for the course.
Her wedding photos became a political scandal
After Trump won the election, Omarosa joined his administration as the director of communications for the Office of the Public Liaison. But it wasn't long before she was pulling diva moves that were reminiscent of her days on The Apprentice. Politico reported that in early April 2017, Omarosa brought members of her 39-person bridal party to the White House for an "extended wedding photo shoot." If she was given permission for the shoot, senior aides and lawyers had no idea about it, and the massive bridal shower was a major distraction. On top of that, Omarosa had to be specifically instructed not to post the wedding photos online out of "security and ethical concerns." According to Politico, the incident did little to help reports that the Trump White House was out of control and mismanaged. Specifically, the Office of the Public Liaison, which Omarosa oversaw.
She walked out of a National Association of Black Journalists convention
In August 2017, Omarosa's presence at a National Association of Black Journalists convention had already caused journalists to pull out of the event in protest. And the situation did not improve when Omarosa took the stage, according to The New York Times. The former Apprentice star was her usual combative self, and the Q&A panel turned into a shouting match after she refused to answer questions about Trump's recent public support for police brutality. The crowd also wasn't thrilled with Omarosa's attempts to change the subject away from the president's divisive stance on racial issues, and she eventually walked off stage.
She allegedly tried to storm the White House after being fired
With less than a year under her belt at the Trump White House, Omarosa was reportedly ousted on Dec. 12, 2017. According to The Daily Beast, her removal was orchestrated by White House Chief of Staff John Kelly who was not a fan of Omarosa popping into the Oval Office and "triggering the president" with political gossip.
However, in true Omarosa fashion, she did not go quietly. The Daily Beast reports that several sources say Omarosa attempted to storm the White House residence in an effort to confront Trump and was allegedly removed by staff. But according to The Hill, there are conflicting reports about Omarosa being escorted from the White House, and soon, sources from the administration began saying that Omarosa had resigned but would stay on until Jan. 20, which eventually became the official story. So whether or not there was a "ruckus" depends on which sources you believe, but it wouldn't be out of character for Omarosa if things had turned nasty.
She claimed she resigned from the White House over racial concerns
Despite her notoriously testy relationship with the press, Omarosa appeared on Good Morning America to set the record straight about her "dramatic exit" from the White House. According to Omarosa's version of events, she had a "straightforward" conversation with Chief of Staff Kelly that prompted her to resign. She also claims that the Secret Service didn't escort her from the premises, but they did restrict her security passes. But the most astonishing moment came when Omarosa expressed racial concerns with the Trump administration that she had championed for so long.
"But when I have my story to tell, as the only African-American woman in this White House, as a senior staff and assistant to the president," she said. "I have seen things that have made me uncomfortable, that have upset me, that have affected me deeply and emotionally, that has affected my community and my people. And when I can tell my story, it is a profound story that I know the world will want to hear."
As for how well that was received, GMA co-host Robin Roberts lit Twitter on fire by capping off Omarosa's segment with a well-timed "Bye, Felicia." The reality star clearly burned numerous bridges working for Trump, and it might take a long time to build them back up again.