U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle could be in hot water after a report disclosed her $100,000 request to pay off a debt soon before her Senate confirmation hearing in July.
Six days before she sat down in front of a congressional panel to assess her qualifications for the diplomatic position, Ms. Guilfoyle messaged a Trump donor for money she owed American Express.
“It won’t show up anywhere if you wire money to American Express,” she wrote on Signal, citing her method to avoid a paper trail, according to The Wall Street Journal. “Please.”
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Her plea was to Eric Deters, a former GOP gubernatorial candidate in Kentucky.
The two have had a working relationship since 2020, he said, when he paid her to speak at events he dubbed the Freedom Fest in response to COVID-19 medical mandates in Kentucky.
Ms. Guilfoyle’s lawyer, Jesse Binnall, said the ambassador had been paid to speak at events before her nomination and “was owed a balance for traveling to and supporting these patriotic events.”
Mr. Deters refuted that, saying he did not owe her any balance.
Before her confirmation hearing, Ms. Guilfoyle texted Mr. Deters, “Honey please I need you to get this done for me today,” adding a prayer hands emoji and a PDF with bill payment instructions from American Express. “You could just send it here.”
Mr. Deters did not ultimately make the payment.
He said Ms. Guilfoyle told him if he came up with the money, “I will be your Trump ride or die, forever and ever.”
But “she never came through on anything,” he said.
They had been in contact for months, and Mr. Deters wanted her help to get the attention of the Trump administration on some personal tax and legal issues.
Ms. Guilfoyle, the former fiancée of Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, promised in a text to Mr. Deters to lobby top Trump administration officials, including FBI Director Kash Patel, former Attorney General Pam Bondi and IRS Chief Billy Long.
“Every secretary of you know defense, transportation, treasury commerce IRS commissioner everyone gets right back to me,” she wrote. “Oh yeah, l’m forgetting … Patel.”
An FBI spokesperson told the Journal that she did not lobby Mr. Patel.
Ms. Guilfoyle also asked Mr. Deters not to text her about their money communications.
“Eric, I really wish you would stop papering all these things,” she said.
“What a nightmare you’ll literally cost me my ambassadorship stop writing,” she said in another exchange.
Mr. Binnall said the ambassador disputed the authenticity of the messages but did not identify which messages were false.
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