“When President Donald Trump has decamped to Mar-a-Lago during his second term, there’s one Cabinet secretary who’s joined him every single time. It’s the same man that the president summons to his table for ice cream sundaes most Friday nights to gossip and replay the week; the same man who was his first call to float some outlandish ideas, including annexing the Panama Canal and creating a $5 million ‘gold card’ visa,” Politico reports.

“That man is Howard Lutnick. Yet talk to almost any Trump ally outside the White House and you’ll hear scant praise for the Commerce secretary. He’s brash and impulsive, catering to Trump’s worst instincts on tariffs that could jeopardize the economy, they whisper. His loud mouth is equally matched by his bad judgment, they steam. And he’s on the outs, his job hanging by a thread — or so the Trump orbit rumor mill goes.”

“But there’s more than a little wishful thinking among Lutnick’s detractors. While their knives have been out for Lutnick for months, some closest to the president say he’s not going anywhere — at least for now.”

Elaine Godfrey: “‘At least 50 percent of my time is devoted to trying to deal with the repercussions, the shock’ of having hundreds of colleagues suddenly disappear, including many researchers who oversaw studies, one senior National Institutes of Health scientist based in Bethesda, Maryland, told me.”

“What outside observers haven’t yet grasped, he and other federal employees said, is just how far things have spiraled out of control.”

“A former top Trump administration official targeted with a federal investigation by President Trump said he would fight back against what he called an unprecedented campaign by the government to punish dissent,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Chris Krebs, one of Trump’s top cybersecurity officials in his first term, will resign from a leading security firm to more freely challenge the White House.”