苏西·怀尔斯的前游说公司在特朗普时期赚了1.86亿美元 如今深陷MAGA派系争斗

Susie Wiles’ old lobbying firm made $186 million under Trump. Now it’s caught in MAGA’s feud

November 10, 2026 / 6:00 AM EST / CBS News

For the last two years, Brian Ballard’s ties to President Trump made his lobbying firm one of the most sought-after in Washington. Now those same ties have made it a target in the Republican Party’s post-midterm infighting.

Calley Means, a former top aide to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., alleged in an interview Sunday with CBS News’ “Face the Nation” that Ballard Partners “controlled” White House policy. Mr. Trump’s former chief of staff, Susie Wiles, worked at the firm for nearly a decade as a managing partner, leaving in 2019.

Means claimed Ballard Partners’ rise to become the top-earning lobbying firm “did not happen by accident.” He accused Wiles and other top advisers to Mr. Trump of catering to industries that funded Republicans ahead of the midterms. Ballard and Wiles both called the claims false.

The firm’s interactions with Wiles as chief of staff “have been limited and have been the exception, not the rule,” Brian Ballard, a longtime Trump fundraiser, said in a rare statement Sunday.

Ballard Partners’ more than $88 million in lobbying revenue last year was, at the time, the most any firm had reported since the Lobbying Disclosure Act took effect in 1996, even after adjusting for inflation, a CBS News analysis of Senate lobbying disclosures found. Through the first three quarters of 2026, the firm has already surpassed that, reporting more than $98 million.

The fortunes of Washington lobbying firms tend to rise and fall with changes in administrations, as companies hire them to try to influence policy. But after an election that saw government corruption polling as a top issue for voters, questions about who has profited from political connections are intensifying. Ballard Partners is now among those ensnared in the MAGA feud.

That tension could deepen ahead of 2028, as Republicans who cheered Mr. Trump’s promise to “drain the swamp” speak out about the realities of an entrenched lobbying industry that has continued to thrive in Washington.

“The Democrats are going to start investigations as soon as they’re sworn in, and White House fighting about who was making money will just elevate the topic,” said Marc Short, a former chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence.

The White House said in a statement that the Trump administration “has never allowed and will never allow outside groups to influence policy decisions.”

A fight over vapes

Brian Ballard has been one of Mr. Trump’s top fundraisers for years, having reeled in $50 million for his campaign in 2024, according to a source familiar with the number who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Since 2008, he has chaired Florida finance committees for previous Republican presidential nominees. His firm opened a Washington office in 2017 and once employed both Wiles and Pam Bondi, who went on to serve as Mr. Trump’s attorney general.

When Mr. Trump won a second term, the firm signed up hundreds of clients, though its relationship with the administration has seen ups and downs. For a brief period in 2025, Brian Ballard was banned from the West Wing after his firm’s lobbying approach for a cryptocurrency client frustrated White House officials, two Trump advisers told CBS News. (Ballard apologized in May 2025 and returned to the White House’s good graces, Axios reported.)

Among the firm’s longest-standing clients is RAI Services Company, a subsidiary of tobacco giant Reynolds American. It has paid Ballard Partners millions of dollars since 2017, lobbying records show.

That relationship placed Ballard at the center of Means’ allegations about favorable treatment for vaping interests. Means resigned in late October, claiming the Make America Healthy Again agenda had stalled in the White House. He placed the blame at Wiles’ feet, saying she and “her deputies were still relentlessly pushing HHS to find a pathway for fruit-flavored vapes.”

In May, the Food and Drug Administration handed the tobacco industry a win with new guidance that could let major tobacco companies sell flavored vapes. The announcement came a week after Brian Ballard and tobacco executives had lunch with Mr. Trump at his golf club in Jupiter, Florida, where the president called Kennedy and other health officials to complain about the FDA, The New York Times reported. The FDA decision also came after RAI Services Company had given $5 million to MAGA Inc., the pro-Trump super PAC, on April 30, Federal Election Commission records show. (FDA Commissioner Marty Makary resigned days after the guidance came out, in protest.) The White House has suggested the donation had nothing to do with the FDA decision.

In his statement Sunday, Ballard said no one at his firm advocated to Wiles or anyone at the White House on authorization for fruit-flavored vapes. He said his advocacy related to “illegal, unregulated vapes from China,” some of which, he said, have been found to be laced with fentanyl.

Wiles told CBS News she had nothing to do with the tobacco industry meeting with Mr. Trump at his golf club.

Means also singled out James Blair, the former deputy chief of staff, claiming he was “relentless on helping the fruit-flavored vape industry.” Blair, who left the White House in April to oversee the GOP’s midterm strategy, has traded barbs with Means on social media, calling the claim that he pushed vapes as a core midterm issue “a complete and total lie.”

“I didn’t promote flavored vaping specifically at all,” Blair told CBS News, adding that he was tasked with making sure the FDA ruled on nicotine product applications swiftly – within six months. “Calley is intentionally misrepresenting my role and my responsibility because he opposes the issue entirely,” Blair added.

Blair spoke with Reynolds and other vape companies about the FDA’s application process, but not about any specific applications or products, according to two sources familiar with the conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Blair has said he is reviewing his legal options and whether to sue Means for defamation.

A MAGA Inc. spokesperson said the group “is pleased to accept legal contributions from those who agree with President Trump’s America First agenda.” A spokesperson for Wiles told Axios that Means’ accusations of corruption were “outrageous, defamatory, and provably false.”

“What Ballard helps you do”

Means’ accusations centered on what he called a “very close-knit crew” around Wiles that “explicitly catered to special interests.” He alleged that the goal was to serve big business interests in exchange for money for the midterms. Steering those donations, he alleged, “is what Ballard helps you do.”

Lobbying firms in Washington routinely advise clients on political giving, and many lobbyists raise money for candidates themselves. The practice is legal, though federal law requires lobbyists to disclose their own contributions twice a year.

Means also pointed to a long-running dispute about glyphosate, the active ingredient in the weedkiller Roundup, which has been linked to cancer. He accused administration officials of siding with Bayer, which makes Roundup, by formally supporting the company’s argument at the Supreme Court to block state lawsuits over the herbicide. A White House official told CBS News that Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote a brief at the court’s request.

Bayer has paid Ballard Partners since January 2024 to lobby Congress and the administration on a number of issues, according to lobbying disclosures. Ballard said no one at the firm lobbied Wiles or the White House on glyphosate.

Means’ claim that Wiles was hostile to the MAHA agenda has drawn pushback from her allies. Two sources, who requested anonymity to describe a private meeting, recounted a White House meeting last year in which an administration official derided MAHA supporters as “nuts.” Wiles shot back: “I’m one of those MAHA nuts,” the sources said.

A White House official told CBS News that Wiles “has been an essential leader in Making America Healthy Again.”

Mr. Trump’s longtime pollster Tony Fabrizio, whom Means accused of working to help pharmaceutical interests, said in a statement that Means’ allegation that he is “in the pocket of Big Pharma” was “ridiculous” and “demonstrably false.” Fabrizio previously urged Republicans to campaign on lowering prescription drug prices, finding in an April 2025 poll that the issue could give GOP candidates in toss-up districts a 20-point boost.

The fight is unlikely to fade soon. California Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia, the incoming chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said he will look into the claims against Wiles. Attorney General Todd Blanche has dismissed Means as a “disgruntled former administration official,” and told CNN the Justice Department would not investigate “something that someone says on a podcast.”

Steve Reilly contributed to this report.