Power steering out in Pontiac G6, changed pump, still out _Need Mechanic Help_

A buddy asked me yesterday to help change his Steering pump in his fiance's G6 convertible.

The steering was very hard, almost impossible to steer and the pump was very noisy.

So no problem. Yanked out pump, separated reservoir and pulley, pressed pulley onto new pump and installed reservoir.
Used a vacuum system to remove air and started the car and turned lock to lock a few times with the cap off. This "new" (remanufactured) NAPA pump sounded worse than the other one we took off. So I made sure we got all the air out and noted the steering hadn't improved.

So I figured the reman part was a bust, went and got another NAPA pump and the same symptoms. Noisy pump and no steering.
Even after turning lock to lock and vacuuming the air out, we still get no hydraulic assist.

The system has no inline filter even though there is a part. The system has no cooler, and it seems to be a basic hydraulic assist rack and pinion.

So at this point do we change the rack?
There is very little online about this car, and it sucks to work on and I'm just trying to help but it's ruining my weekend.

every single time I had power steering go out I swapped out the pump and all was fine. The rack works manually, so it is possible it's the issue, just hoping that maybe I missed something obvious and some awesome GM tech will help me out here.