Former Donald Trump campaign volunteer Shane Bouvet received a $10,000 check in the mail on Monday from President Trump after meeting with him less than two weeks earlier.
Bouvet, a 24-year-old FedEx courier and single father from rural Illinois, spent nights working and days volunteering for Trump's presidential campaign.
Two days before Trump was sworn in as president, the Washington Post published a profile on Bouvet that highlighted his involvement with the campaign. He went from delivering signs for the campaign to becoming its volunteer social media coordinator in Illinois. His work with the campaign earned him an invitation to the inaugural ball near Washington, D.C.
The evening before his inauguration, Trump took some time to meet with Bouvet in a tent behind the Lincoln Memorial, where he praised him for his work on the campaign. He then hugged the 24-year-old and promised him a $10,000 check as a special thank you.
Bouvet received the check in the mail on Monday, the Washington Post reported.
"Shane–You are a great guy–thanks for all of your help," a note from Trump on presidential stationery read.
Bouvet was in disbelief at his good fortune.
"I'm still just living in a dream," Bouvet said. "I never thought in a million years this would happen."
Bouvet said that he plans on using the $10,000 check to help pay for his father's chemotherapy, as he suffers from bladder cancer. When asked whether he believes Trump is living up to his hopes, Bouvet said that he was impressed by the president's quick moves to implement his campaign agenda.
"He's getting things done," Bouvet told the Post. "He's laying down the law. I'm really blessed with that–that's what we need. Most politicians are all talk, no action."
Bouvet also dismissed questions regarding Russia's interference in the election, including other controversies, and said that his standard for judging Trump is based off what he believes is best for his hometown, Stonington, the Post reported in its profile before the inauguration.
Stonington, which sits amid tilled fields of rich, black earth flat as tabletops, has a story that became familiar during the election. It has been hard hit by plant closures and the shuttering of a nearby mine that once employed Bouvet's grandfather. Bouvet said his own father had worked hard at a local foundry to move the family from a trailer into a tidy home. Now, he has cancer, and his mother faces a long commute to a minimum-wage job after a layoff.
"I get tired of seeing people hit rock bottom," Bouvet said. "If you go to the coffee shops, the old guys talk about the old days when engines roared and things weren’t built in China."