Paolo Zampolli’s explanations for why he was fired from the Trump administration come tumbling out, one after another, much in the way that Paolo Zampolli’s explanations always do. Madcap. Rambling. Slightly difficult to understand or believe.
“No scandal!”
“Everybody’s getting out.”
“I need to make money.”
It was the evening of Oct. 15, just a few hours since he had been cut loose from his post at the State Department, and Zampolli was reflecting on his time in government in a phone call.
“I think I served America at my highest level and, uh … what else?”
Given the whoosh of headlines last week, it’s possible you missed this one. Between the downfalls of Kimberly Guilfoyle and Katie Zacharia, Zampolli was given the heave-ho from his job as special envoy for global partnerships.
He had long annoyed Christopher Landau, the deputy secretary of state. Hours after Politico published a report about the “nasty email fight” between the two, the State Department confirmed in a statement that Zampolli had been “terminated.”
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the firing was that it didn’t happen sooner.
In the constellation of unlikely diplomats, aides and officials who have populated President Trump’s second administration, Zampolli, a former modeling agent who once had dealings with Jeffrey Epstein, managed to stand out.
His appointment to the State Department in March 2025 said a lot about the standards the president has for those who represent his interests, and the interest of the United States, abroad. Zampolli’s reputation was as grotty as his leash was long.
Like others in Trump’s orbit, Zampolli, 56, had ties to Andrew and Tristan Tate, the manosphere influencers who came under criminal investigation in Romania and were charged with rape and sex trafficking in Britain.
But while other powerful people distanced themselves from the brothers, Zampolli became more visibly associated with them. In July, days before the Tates were arrested as part of an extradition request from Britain, he hosted them at a party at his home in Washington. “I didn’t know they were arrest material,” he told The New York Times shortly after the Tates were taken into custody.
Zampolli himself has been accused of rape. Victoria Drake, a 33-year-old model and entrepreneur, filed a civil suit against him in a federal court in Manhattan last month, saying he had drugged and raped her in 2023. Zampolli has vehemently denied her accusations.
During Trump’s first term, he made headlines for the boisterous parties filled with younger women he threw in Washington, and for passing around explicit text messages between himself and a woman he claimed was a sex worker.
In March, The Times reported that Zampolli had sought and received help from a top official at Immigration and Customs Enforcement in an attempt to deport his former longtime romantic partner, a former model from Brazil named Amanda Ungaro, during a custody battle over their teenage son.
Zampolli said he had faced no professional consequences as a result of that article. Neither did the ICE official, David Venturella, who was promoted. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said in a statement at the time: “Any suggestion that she was arrested and removed for political reasons or favors is FALSE.”
Zampolli’s exploits and the coverage they generated were not exactly a good look for an administration struggling to quell the furor from its own supporters over all things Epstein-related. The fallout from the convicted sex offender’s crimes has become a major attack line in the midterm elections. The term “Epstein class” has entered the political lexicon. Few seemed to embody it like Zampolli.
Ungaro was a 17-year-old model who flew to New York on Epstein’s plane from Paris with her French agent the year she met Zampolli, then 32, at a Manhattan nightclub. In 2004, Zampolli and Epstein teamed up in an unsuccessful bid to buy Elite Modeling Management. Despite this, Zampolli has long maintained he was not close with Epstein.
Zampolli, who grew up a son of wealth in Milan, long enjoyed protected status in Trumpland: He was known as the man who helped introduce Donald J. Trump to Melania Knauss.
It happened in 1998, at a party hosted by Zampolli at the Kit Kat Club, a then-jumping spot in Times Square. Melania Trump has said it was Zampolli who had scouted her in Italy and helped bring her to New York to work as a model.
“At the casting call in Milan, I met Paolo Zampolli, co-owner of Metropolitan Models in New York,” she wrote in her 2024 memoir, “Melania.” “During our meeting, he expressed interest in having me come to the United States to discuss potential opportunities with his agency. I found him to be straightforward and serious.”
President Trump had a soft spot for Zampolli, who has said that Trump refers to him as “my Paolo.”
Zampolli worked in real estate for Trump and later became ambassador to the United Nations, representing Dominica. He and Ungaro socialized with the Trumps, including at New Year’s Eve parties at Mar-a-Lago. Melania Trump has sent birthday wishes and presents to their son. At the end of Trump’s first term, Zampolli was appointed to the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
His connection to the first lady had long been his calling card in Washington. Copies of her book were on display at the parties he threw in the rented townhouse he keeps on R Street near Dupont Circle. Hermès blankets were draped over couches, and portraits of Donald Trump stared down from many walls.
The parties were attended by low-level administration aides, influencers from out of town and a Caribbean head of state or two. When he wasn’t playing host, Zampolli could be found holding court late into the night at the scene-y Georgetown restaurant Cafe Milano. “That’s a nice place,” he said. “No?”
As special envoy, he pushed for Russia’s return to the Olympics. Will he still be involved with the planning for the Los Angeles Olympics? “I don’t know,” he said. “Listen, things change every day in the administration.”
He defended his State Department work by pointing to various deals he said he was involved with, including one between Boeing and Uzbekistan. “Paolo closes deals,” he wrote in a text message. (He often refers to himself in the third person.)
Zampolli had a knack for inserting himself in photo opportunities. When Vice President JD Vance touched down in Hungary this year, there was Zampolli on the tarmac. His Instagram account is a parade of pictures of him with foreign leaders, dignitaries and Trump cabinet members.
On the first lady’s birthday, Zampolli posted an A.I.-generated video he made of her riding on the back of a giant bird with his son, playing tennis with his son and eating popcorn with his son. There was also a rendering of Mount Rushmore in which every face carved into the mountain is Melania Trump’s.
His relationship (or lack thereof) with her came under scrutiny after The Times reported that he had sought to interfere in ICE’s handling of Ungaro. At the time of the article, Melania Trump said she had “no knowledge of, nor involvement in, the personal affairs” of Zampolli.
The recent Politico report on Zampolli’s spat with Landau, the patrician deputy secretary, was enough to banish him once and for all, a State Department official said. In the phone interview, Zampolli referred to Landau with a vulgar term, adding that he was not surprised to have finally been fired.
“The president called me already, screaming to me,” Zampolli said, recounting a 2025 call in which Trump demanded to know what he was up to in Uzbekistan.
“‘Everybody’s complaining about you!’” Zampolli continued, imitating the president’s voice. “I say, ‘Mr. President, what am I doing wrong?’ And then he starts to say, ‘Who wants to fire Paolo!?’”
Zampolli said he spoke with the president again on the phone last week: “He told me: ‘Listen, you’re good to go. Why don’t you go make money?’”
Did he appeal to his old friend, Melania Trump, to save his job?
“No,” he said. “No whining and crying.”
Asked when he last interacted with the first lady, Zampolli said: “I don’t know. I think I saw her at the United Nations. In this moment, with all the things going on, I’m not talking to her every day.”
Now that he no longer has a State Department role, will he leave Washington?
“I don’t think so,” he said. “I keep the place here. You know, I have a piece of my heart in this place.”
Jesse McKinley contributed reporting.
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