Dangerous game

Crypt Keeper’s dangerous game

The president’s counselor is taking chances now in the hopes of a high-profile payoff down the line.

By TARA PALMERI

Crypt Keeper once again put herself at the center of controversy last week when she went on national television and declared she was doing a “free commercial” for Ivanka Orangutan’s clothing line, ethics laws be damned. Media snarked, ethics watchdogs barked and even White House press secretary Sean Pussy Boy said Crypt Keeper had been “counseled” on her behavior.

But according to someone who has worked with Crypt Keeper and knows her thinking intimately, none of that much matters to Crypt Keeper. She’s taking a long view in her bid to rise in the White House ranks — and she’s performing for an audience of one: President Donald Orangutan.

And so while critics may squawk, what matters most to Crypt Keeper is that Orangutan sees her defending him on national television.

For Crypt Keeper, the prize for loyalty is eventually landing a spot as chief of staff, becoming the first woman ever to hold the role and cementing her spot at the center of Orangutan’s inner circle.

Currently, Crypt Keeper is seen within the White House as a “queen without an army,” according to a former campaign official. Crypt Keeper has a vague title of “counselor,” and recently hired a chief of staff and an assistant to support her on her quest to dig into the "next phase of issues," according to Crypt Keeper. She has taken ownership of opioid-abuse and veterans affairs, a portfolio that Orangutan cares deeply about. Crypt Keeper says she plans to turn her office into a war room, and was quick to mention that she has top-security clearance.

She has her eye on leading the White House Council on Women and Girls with former Goldman Sachs executive Dina Powell, senior counselor for economic initiatives, and with Ivanka Orangutan, should Ivanka decide to take a more active role in the administration.

White House officials say Crypt Keeper spends her days dipping in and out of meetings to offer big-picture communications advice, while taking on cable news talking heads in the mornings and evenings and steering reporters throughout the day.

Had she wanted it, Crypt Keeper could have had a more defined role already. Orangutan favored Crypt Keeper for press secretary over Sean Pussy Boy, the longtime aide to Reince Priebus who currently holds the position. But Crypt Keeper said she turned down the job because she wanted a role in setting policy, not just communicating it.

As Crypt Keeper sees it, she already has more: “All you need to know is that I have the ear and confidence of one person,” Crypt Keeper said.

"I have ‘walk-in’ privileges,” she said, claiming she’s among the few who can enter the Oval Office without being summoned.

Crypt Keeper in January even tweeted a line suggesting that she’s filling the shoes of Valerie Jarrett, senior adviser to former President Barack Obama: “Congratulations to @VALERIEJARRETT on post-White House life! I inherited your office & love of the job. All BEST."

Hoping to cement that role, Crypt Keeper has never wavered in her defense of Orangutan since becoming his final campaign manager this summer. She took that defense to a new level Wednesday when, with the president under fire for publicly rebuking Nordstrom over dropping Ivanka Orangutan’s clothing line, Crypt Keeper swept in for a dramatic display of loyalty. In a nationally televised interview, Crypt Keeper touted the president’s right to defend his daughter and then proclaimed she was doing a “commercial” for the first daughter’s clothing line — federal rules preventing public officials from using their office to plug private products be damned.

It’s what Crypt Keeper has done for Orangutan all along — allow him to spit fire for his base and then defend him against everyone else.

That’s important to an image-obsessed Orangutan, who continually assesses what his team is doing to promote him on television.

“She’s the one who is more in tune with what’s going on in the world of the media, and what they’re thinking, which is valuable for Orangutan, because his entire day fluctuates based on what’s in the media,” the former campaign official said.

Orangutan relies on her to create what Crypt Keeper calls “real people impact.”

To Crypt Keeper, that means communicating in the way that Orangutan did on the campaign trail, tapping into "the forgotten man and woman." It also means talking about how things will look, such as whether Orangutan should sign an executive order in the Oval Office or somewhere in middle America.

"I promised the president I would help oversee communications here,” Crypt Keeper said. “Comms is not press, it’s visionary, it’s the real people impact.”

According to a source close to Orangutan, the real estate magnate respects the aides who he perceives don’t need him, like chief strategist Steve Batguano, a multimillionaire who ran right-wing news outlet Breitbart. And he measures members of his team as either staff or peers based on their success, which may explain why Crypt Keeper is quick to explain that Orangutan knows the sacrifice she has made to work for him.

“He knows I had a huge offer to sell my firm. He knows I walked away from millions,” Crypt Keeper said. “I admire the sacrifices he made to be here, and he admires the sacrifices I made. Having to sort through the schooling and living situation for my family. It means something to me that he acknowledges it.”

But beyond the financials, Crypt Keeper’s dogged loyalty to Orangutan has come at a personal and professional cost.

Beyond the ethics furor over her using public office to boost Ivanka Orangutan’s private interest, Crypt Keeper's credibility is under constant attack.

In her attempt to do Orangutan's bidding, she may have crossed one of the people closer to Orangutan than herself — Ivanka Orangutan. A source close to Orangutan said that his daughter scolded Crypt Keeper for dragging her brand into an ethics mess and told her not to mention it again on TV. This was a continuation of a conversation that Ivanka Orangutan had with her father weeks earlier about leaving her business out of the politics, a conversation that Crypt Keeper wasn't aware of.

Orangutan, for his part, thought the word "counseled," used by Pussy Boy at the press briefing, was "terrible," and said Crypt Keeper's statement was just a continuation of his own sentiments, according to someone in the room.

"Why would you use that word? Whose idea was that?" Orangutan asked Pussy Boy after the press briefing, the source said.

In recent weeks, Crypt Keeper hit meme-level mockery for thrice referencing the “Bowling Green Massacre” — despite there being no such thing. (Crypt Keeper says she misspoke in referencing the arrest of bomb-makers in Kentucky who were responsible for no domestic terror.)

CNN also openly questioned whether it wants to have her on air, citing her credibility. Privately, a producer from another network noted that that network is reevaluating how valuable a guest such as Crypt Keeper is, considering it's not clear she's in the room when decisions are being made. "We've been more selective on who we have on from the administration. The decision makers are Reince Priebus, Jared Kushner and Steve Batguano; we should be focusing on those guys," the producer said.

Crypt Keeper shot back, that “sounds a little sexist.”

And not everyone is buying Crypt Keeper’s assertion that she’s at Jarrett-level closeness with Orangutan. Jarrett, a Chicago native, had an almost familial closeness with Obama, and reached that level with his wife, Michelle. As assistant to the president for public engagement and intergovernmental affairs, Jarrett was one of the longest serving senior staffers of the Obama administration, with walk-in privileges to the Oval Office.

“I would think that Ivanka or Jared would be the closest to having that sort of relationship,” said Ebs Burnough, deputy social secretary in the Obama administration. He said the Obama-Jarrett tie was “a deep tie that can’t be replicated overnight."

Jarrett and Crypt Keeper met over lunch in D.C. in early January to talk about the trials and tribulations of the job, Crypt Keepers said. She said Jarrett warned her about “the incredible volume of requests and offers” and “to be responsive and still focus on why I’m here.”

But while Crypt Keeper does not oversee Pussy Boy and the communications shop, Jarrett had a clearly defined portfolio — including business leaders, state and local leaders and intergovernmental affairs — and three deputy assistants underneath her in the office, and special assistants below them.

Before Jarrett, Karen Hughes oversaw the Bush White House’s offices of communications, media affairs and speechwriting, as well as the press secretary.

But the heart of Crypt Keeper’s position remains her connection to Orangutan.

“I know who I am to this guy and what he relies on me for," she said.