“I’m disappointed in myself for leaving, but it was a killer, I mean, no joke.”
— Former White House chief of staff John Kelly, quoted by the Morristown Daily Record, on working for President Trump.
“I’m disappointed in myself for leaving, but it was a killer, I mean, no joke.”
— Former White House chief of staff John Kelly, quoted by the Morristown Daily Record, on working for President Trump.
Former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly again weighed in on the impeachment proceedings, telling NJ Advance Media that a trial without witnesses should be considered “half a trial.”
Said Kelly: “In my view, they kind of leave themselves open to a lot of criticism. It seems it was half a trial.”
“The former White House chief of staff, John Kelly, on Wednesday declined to answer questions about the existence of a memo he wrote saying that President Trump had ordered officials to give his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, a security clearance in May 2018,” the New York Times reports.
“Mr. Kelly also broke with Mr. Trump on key aspects of his approach to immigration and the NATO alliance, and said that his top concern about decisions made by the president was whether they were objectively right for the country when divorced from political concerns.”
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Politico: “White House aides predicted that Nick Ayers, if tapped despite internal opposition to his selection, would focus the West Wing almost entirely on the president’s reelection effort.”
Said one former White House official: “You’re going to have a White House that’s all politics all the time.”
Also interesting: “Ayers himself, however, is a polarizing figure within the West Wing whose rise has already sparked controversy. Several aides have told the president they would quit if he is tapped for the job, with one predicting a ‘melee of backstabbing’ to come.”
President Trump confirmed that White House Chief of Staff John Kelly “will leave by the end of the year, capping the retired Marine general’s rocky tenure as the president’s top aide,” the Washington Post reports.
“Trump had previously said Kelly would serve as his chief of staff through 2020, but their clashes were an open secret. Nick Ayers, who currently serves as Vice President Pence’s chief of staff, is widely expected to be Kelly’s replacement.”
“White House chief of staff John Kelly was interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team in recent months,” CNN reports.
“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.”
“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.”
“John Kelly is expected to resign as White House chief of staff in the coming days,” CNN reports.
“Seventeen months in, Kelly and President 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.”
New York Times: “Mr. Kelly and Mr. Trump have grown weary with each other. But Mr. Trump, according to several senior administration officials and people close to him, has so far been unable to bring himself to personally fire a retired four-star military general.”
Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski told TMZ that while he never got into a physical altercation with White House chief of staff John Kelly, as was reported, he could take on the 68-year old retired general in a fight.
Daily Beast: “He was a stately general called in to replace the omnishambles with order. But since his first day as White House chief of staff, John Kelly’s grasp on power in Trumpworld has been tenuous.”
“Now, as Trump enters the back end of his first term in office, determined to shake up his team at the senior ranks and facing a Democratic-run House, Kelly’s grasp has been exposed as flimsier than ever. With the president mangling an overseas trip and infighting among White House staff nearing Civil War-like levels, the chief of staff appears to be more of a bystander to the chaos than a manager of it. No one, at this juncture, is particularly surprised.”
“An argument last February between the White House chief of staff, John F. Kelly, and Corey Lewandowski, an informal adviser to President Trump, turned into a physical altercation that required Secret Service intervention just outside the Oval Office,” the New York Times reports.
“The episode, details of which have not been previously reported, is the latest illustration of the often chaotic atmosphere Mr. Trump is willing to tolerate in the White House as well as a reflection of the degree to which Mr. Kelly’s temper can be provoked.”
“The near brawl — during which Mr. Kelly grabbed Mr. Lewandowski by the collar and tried to have him ejected from the West Wing — came at a time when the chief of staff was facing uncertainty about how long Mr. Trump would keep him in his job. A guessing game over his departure has colored his tenure ever since.”
“A heated argument in the West Wing between chief of staff John Kelly and national security adviser John Bolton over a recent surge in border crossings turned into a shouting match Thursday,” CNN reports.
“The exchange lay bare a bitter disagreement that has existed between two of President Trump’s top aides for weeks now. Trump, who was incensed about the rising levels of migrants and threatened to shut down the southern border on Twitter earlier that morning, took Bolton’s side during the argument.”
“The fight between Kelly and Bolton startled several aides throughout the West Wing on Thursday… adding that the raised voices went well beyond the heated discussions of the Trump administration.”
Bloomberg: “The shouting match was so intense that other White House aides worried one of the two men might immediately resign.”
Omarosa Manigault Newman released a recording on NBC News in which she says White House chief of staff John Kelly can be heard allegedly threatening her when she was fired.
In the clip, a voice said to be that of Kelly can be heard urging Newman to agree to a “friendly departure” from the White House so that she can “go on without any type of difficulty in the future relative to your reputation.”
Playbook: “This is allegedly from the situation room in the White House. Again, let that sink in. An adviser to the president brought a recording device into the situation room to record the chief of staff.”
“White House chief of staff John Kelly told staff on Monday that President Trump had asked him to remain in his post through the 2020 election, White House officials said, a request that comes as tensions between the two men have eased in recent months,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Mr. Kelly told staff he agreed to the president’s request.”
Playbook: “There’s still a decent amount of doubt in the White House that Kelly will last any more than a few months. But it’s all a guessing game!”
Politico: “A year into the job, Kelly’s attempts to implement traditional processes in an untraditional White House have failed, according to a dozen people in and outside the administration — though virtually all concede the West Wing runs better than it used to. Kelly’s allies say he took the job out of a sense of duty, and he has suggested he doesn’t enjoy it much. … Early mornings in the office have been supplanted by sweat sessions at the gym.”
“Many of Trump’s friends and advisers have concluded the president doesn’t really want a chief of staff — and he has several confidants urging him to operate without one. But for this president, keeping Kelly around offers the best of both worlds: somebody to blame when things go awry but nobody fettering his freedom of action.”
CNN: “It’s not clear how Kelly’s eventual departure — whether it comes in a matter of days, weeks, or months — might affect the structure he sought to impose. In recent weeks, Trump has told confidants he misses the chaos of the early days of his administration, which mirrored his style as a real estate impresario with its large cast of advisers and competing internal factions.”
“Still, Trump has looked to two experienced political hands as possible Kelly successors, polling friends and advisers about the possibility of tapping Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney or Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff Nick Ayers to take the reins. Mulvaney, whose sharp wit has impressed Trump, is seen as the strongest candidate, three sources inside the West Wing told CNN, though Trump has remarked that he likes Ayers’ hair.”
“Yet there remains no obvious successor for Kelly, which is why many believe Trump has not replaced him yet.”
Politico: “According to four people close to Kelly, the former Marine general has largely yielded his role as the enforcer in the West Wing as his relationship with Trump has soured. While Kelly himself once believed he stood between Trump and chaos, he has told at least one person close to him that he may as well let the president do what he wants, even if it leads to impeachment — at least this chapter of American history would come to a close.”
Several months ago, President Trump “ordered the promotion of Rudy Giuliani’s son. But instead of getting promoted, he has lost his West Wing pass,” Axios reports.
“We’re told that chief of staff John Kelly did not follow through on the order, and Andrew has not been promoted. Kelly and others, including Office of Public Liaison director Justin Clark, won’t promote Andrew because they think he ‘subverts the chain of command’ and claim he had other issues in the workplace that they weren’t happy about.”
“A miserable place to work.”
— White House chief of staff John Kelly, quoted by the New York Times, telling senators what it’s like to work in the White House.
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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