White House Shake-Ups And Shenanigans

Ken AshfordL'Affaire Russe, Trump & AdministrationLeave a Comment

Trump started today with an anti-Mueller screed — something he started on last night.

He just sounds like a crazy old man.

He’s feeling the pressure.  More Mueller stuff expected today.  And the Kelly-Trump breakdown is complete — they aren’t even talking, and Kelly is expected to go.  Yeah, yeah. We have heard that before. But multiple outlets are reporting it.

Axios reports:

West Wing officials widely believe that chief of staff John Kelly’s departure is imminent and that Nick Ayers, chief of staff to Vice President Pence, will replace him. As we reported right after the midterms, Ayers’ backers have been telling the president he has the sharp political instincts to remake the West Wing to better combat the hazards ahead. Jared and Ivanka have boosted him. But he has a number of detractors who have been trying to convince the president he’d be a disaster.

CNN reports:

Seventeen months in, Kelly and President Donald Trump have reached a stalemate in their relationship and it is no longer seen as tenable by either party. Though Trump asked Kelly over the summer to stay on as chief of staff for two more years, the two have stopped speaking in recent days.

The expected departure would end a tumultuous tenure for Kelly, who was brought on to bring order to the White House but whose time as chief of staff has often been marked by the same infighting and controversy that has largely defined Trump’s presidency from its beginning. Many of the storms in which Kelly became embroiled were by his own making.

But, it seems we have an AG in line:

UPDATE:  Whoops. Forgot this one.

Now he’s just being an asshole for the attention.

UPDATE: Oh, now we know why Trump and Kelly aren’t talking….

White House chief of staff John Kelly was interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team in recent months, three people with knowledge of the matter told CNN.

Kelly responded to a narrow set of questions from special counsel investigators after White House lawyers initially objected to Mueller’s request to do the interview earlier this summer, the sources said. Kelly is widely expected to leave his position in the coming days and is no longer on speaking terms with President Donald Trump, CNN reported earlier Friday.

Kelly is the latest high-ranking White House official known to provide information for Mueller’s investigation, though his interview marks a departure of sorts since Kelly didn’t join the White House until July 2017. Most of the dozens of other interviews have been with people who were associated with the Trump campaign, were part of the transition or served in the early part of the administration.

Still, it could be worse….

Oh, and the Dow is down another 550 today, after weak monthly news indicating an economic slowdown.

UPDATE — Aaaaand now the playground antics continue.

Former secretary of state Rex Tillerson, who earlier today declared (on video) that his former boss is undisciplined, won’t read anything, much less his press briefings, and had to be talked about committing “illegal acts” multiple times.  According to Tillerson, “So often, the president would say here’s what I want to do & here’s how I want to do it and I would have to say to him, Mr. President I understand what you want to do but you can’t do it that way. It violates the law.”

I guess Trump heard about it, because he responded —

Jesus Christ. Rex Tillerson was chairman and CEO of ExxonMobil, one of the most powerful industry titans in the world.  Couldn’t be THAT dumb, using Trump’s metric.

Also, Trump HIRED him.

This week’s damage: The Dow fell 1,150 points. Down 4.5% for the week.