The Noem-Lewandowski Affair Rumors: A Timeline.

Fast-forward to December 2020, and Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowski were still exhibiting PDA with zero care about who might see them. And just like at the 2019 Florida conference, they were spotted acting inappropriately, in this case at an event at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

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Speaking to New York Post, one onlooker recalled, “I saw her on his lap.” Like Intelligencer’s source, the tabloid’s insider simply assumed they were together. “I thought they were a couple. They were all over each other,” they said. Another guest at the party said much the same thing, confirming that Noem had indeed been sitting on Lewandowski. However, this source’s recollection went, ahem, a touch further, describing what they were doing as, “playing grab-ass.” Of their behavior, the witness said it was, “the usual stuff that drunk people who are having affairs do.” Yikes.

It bears mentioning that for the September 2023 story about the alleged affair, New York Post spoke with a whopping five sources, and several of those insiders described it as an open secret. Just the kind of rep a politician supposedly passionate about old-school values would want to have. But, wait, there’s more.

Another conference, another opportunity to put your uber-inappropriate love affair on full display, it would seem, because an insider who spoke with New York Post for the same explosive story in September 2023 claimed that at the 2021 Conservative Political Action Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Orlando, Florida, Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowski, both of whom are married, were seen getting “handsy.” Yes, you read that right, and, yes, we’re feeling queasy too.

According to the source, Noem and Lewandowski were at the hotel’s bar when they began acting inappropriately, and, no, it wasn’t while they thought they were alone. Au contraire, though the source didn’t specify exactly when it had happened, they did make a point of clarifying, “It wasn’t like 2 a.m.” The observer also described the place as being packed with upward of 100 other patrons — and people who would know who they were, at that. “It’s a lobby bar where everyone is staying, and so there’s a bajillion political operatives and journalists and electeds around. I remember I saw it with my own eyes and a couple other people saw it, and the blatantness was absurd,” they said.

Several months after February’s CPAC 2021, American Greatness published the first report about Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowski’s alleged affair, also calling Noem out for using shady tactics to secure her daughter’s real estate appraiser license. An insider told the outlet about the rumored rendezvous with Lewandowski, “There are members of Congress close to Mar-a-Lago who have called the affair ‘an open secret.'” The piece  ended with a zinger that lambasted Noem for both her alleged corruption and the affair in one fell swoop: “Noem appeals to constitutional fidelity to excuse inaction and graft but has no such fidelity itself.”

Unsurprisingly, Noem denied there was any truth to the rumor and clapped back in a since-deleted post to X (formerly known as Twitter), accusing the outlet of misogyny. “These old, tired attacks on conservative women are based on a falsehood that we can’t achieve anything without a man’s help,” she wrote (via People). She insisted in the post, “I love Bryon. I’m proud of the God-fearing family we’ve raised together.” Lewandowski, for his part, did not respond to the report, nor did he issue a statement gushing over his wife, Alison, who had already endured the major tragedy of losing her first husband. Given that Noem later deleted her X post, she may have been of the mind that ignoring the rumors were the best way to keep calm and carry on. However, that doesn’t mean everyone else stopped talking about them. Far from it, chatter about the supposed affair would continue for years.

In September 2023, Daily Mail ran a story on Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowski’s affair containing way more details than had previously been published. Once again, insiders told Daily Mail that Noem and Lewandowski had been seen cavorting after hours at conferences, taking a long beach stroll together while they were at the 2020 Republican Attorneys General Association meeting, and being so touchy-feely at the 2019 AMPFest (an annual conference for MAGA enthusiasts) that people once again believed they were a couple. Indeed, attendees at AMPFest didn’t understand why Noem was there, not having a defined role; as one guest told the publication, it seemed as though she came solely to hang out with Lewandowski.

Daily Mail also shared damning allegations from a RAGA 2021 gathering, held at the posh St. Regis in Aspen, Colorado. A source said that Noem skipped several events she was expected at because she was with Lewandowski at his hotel. Another attendee alleged she then pressured conference organizers to move Lewandowski to the St. Regis, into a room close to hers.

Lewandowski declined to address the romance rumors. Noem’s camp claimed they were retribution for her endorsement of Donald Trump not long before the story came out.

Fast-forward to early 2025: Kristi Noem had been named secretary of Homeland Security, and Corey Lewandowski was her temporary adviser, despite having been fired from Trump’s super PAC in 2021, after a Trump donor claimed he touched her inappropriately while using sexually graphic language at a charity event in Las Vegas.

Blending their professional and personal lives became easier when Noem and Lewandowski moved in to neighboring apartment blocks. As if Kristi and Bryon Noem’s living situation wasn’t already weird (Bryon was rumored to have left the South Dakota governor’s mansion as far back as 2021), the conveniently close location of the residences of the Homeland Security chief and her top adviser raised a ton of eyebrows — not least because it wasn’t as though the pair were staying within the confines of their respective buildings. In comments to the Daily Mail, one of Noem’s neighbors said, “I’ve seen them together here both in the elevator and in common areas.” They once again reiterated the claim that, “It is an open secret that they are together.”

Kristi tried to defuse the affair rumors in late February 2025, when she brought her husband along for a dinner at the White House, taking to X to share pics of their “date night.” However, the comments on her post were evidence enough that her attempts had backfired miserably, with many inquiring as to Lewandowski’s whereabouts.

Given just how long the Kristi Noem, Corey Lewandowski affair rumors have been swirling, it’s almost admirable that for several years, the Homeland Security secretary and her husband continued to post loving posts in each other’s honor. However, 2025 marked a very noticeable change to this public display of endearment.

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For many watchers, Bryon Noem’s social media gave a clue about the breakup rumors, with the former first gentleman of South Dakota going from posting semi-regular loving declarations on Instagram to nothing. Then there were the birthday posts. First, Bryon outright snubbed Kristi’s birthday (again, after years of loved-up posts). A few weeks later, when Bryon celebrated his birthday, Kristi did effusively praise him online, but she left out one telling word: husband. Unsurprisingly, though she’d gushed over him being a great family man and father, the omission sent the Lewandoswki affair rumors back into overdrive.

Throughout all the drama, camp Kristi has maintained that there is no affair, even referring to it as “salacious, baseless gossip” (via Daily Beast). Her DHS team has also complained about outlets continuing to report on the rumors, with one representative telling Daily Beast about a New York magazine piece, “It’s not just lazy — it’s libelous — peddling anonymous gossip while ignoring our exhaustive, on-the-record rebuttals that destroy their narrative.” Lewandowski, on the other hand, has kept mum (even when the rumored affair had put his career on the verge of blowing up). Still, considering just how many insiders have spoken out about what they’ve described as blatantly boo’d-up behavior, we don’t see this rumor going away anytime soon.