Ex-ICE official running for Congress accused of having abusive relationship with staffer

A former deputy director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement under Trump now running for Congress, is facing accusations of a controlling, abusive relationship with subordinates.

The Daily Mail broke the story on Thursday, reporting that Madison Sheahan, who is now running for the ninth congressional district in Ohio, had a controlling, "toxic" relationship with a 19-year-old woman who worked with Sheahan on the Trump 2020 presidential campaign.

"I think a lot of the problems with our relationship was that she's not comfortable in her own skin," the anonymous young woman told the Daily Mail about Sheahan. "It's okay to be gay...but I don't think that's something she has accepted."

Sheahan declined to comment for the Daily Mail. Her political advisor Bob Pudachik denied the accusations, saying "Madison was not and has never been in a relationship with a subordinate."

The Daily Mail reported that Sheahan "exerted control over her younger partner" and lashed out over the clothes she wore or smoking a cigarette. The relationship started when Sheahan was a senior official with the Ohio Republican Party, and while she was on the Trump 2020 campaign's payroll, the Daily Mail reported. Sheahan was 23 at the time.

The younger lover was living in Sheahan's home after she lost her student housing at Denison University amid the COVID-19 pandemic, she told the Daily Mail, and Sheahan was even her supervisor at one point in 2020.

Sheahan reportedly yelled at her younger lover over the phone when she disagreed with what she wore to go out, telling her "what the [expletive], you're not gonna [expletive] go. Are you actually [expletive] serious? I'm not gonna talk to you again." Another anonymous source who worked with Sheahan at the time told the Daily Mail they could hear the tirade through the walls.

In late 2021, Sheahan tried to stop her secret girlfriend from moving to Washington D.C., and the relationship ended soon after in 2022 over the phone, Sheahan's ex told the Daily Mail.

Sheahan was appointed as Kristi Noem's political director when she was governor of South Dakota. When Noem became the DHS director, she hired Sheahan as an ICE deputy director in March 2025, and Sheahan left the post in January to run for Congress.