Political Wire

  • Front Page
  • Members
    • Subscribe
    • Sign In
  • Trending
  • Resources
    • Politics Extra
    • Political Job Hunt
    • Political Dictionary
    • Electoral Vote Map
  • Advertise
  • Newsletter
  • Contact Us
  • Saturday
  • Sunday
  • Monday
  • Tuesday
  • Wednesday
  • Thursday
  • Today
Members should sign in for the full experience.

Johnson Enlists Priebus for ‘Autopsy’ of Wisconsin GOP

November 30, 2018 at 10:46 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) “is the only statewide Republican left standing in Wisconsin. And now, he’s ready to take on a new role to help the party get back on track,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Johnson said former RNC chairman Reince Priebus has agreed “to participate in a thorough review of the 2018 election and the current party structure — similar to the process he led for the RNC following the 2012 presidential election.”

Filed Under: Republicans Tagged With: Reince Priebus, Ron Johnson, Wisconsin

Priebus Won’t Run for Ryan’s Seat

April 12, 2018 at 10:49 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said “he will not run to replace Speaker Paul Ryan in their native state of Wisconsin — but he declined to rule out running for public office in the future,” Politico reports.

Filed Under: 2018 Campaign Tagged With: Reince Priebus, WI-1

Priebus Opens Up About His Time in the White House

February 14, 2018 at 3:58 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus confirms to Vanity Fair the media’s portrayal of a White House in disarray and riven by conflict: “Take everything you’ve heard and multiply it by 50.”

Here’s how he describes the aftermath of President Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey:

While Priebus and Bannon watched the fiasco explode as the pundits excoriated the Trump White House on every cable news show, Kushner did a slow burn. He was livid, furious that the communications team could not defend Comey’s firing. Bannon blew his stack. “There’s not a fucking thing you can do to sell this!,” he shouted at Kushner. “Nobody can sell this! P. T. Barnum couldn’t sell this! People aren’t stupid! This is a terrible, stupid decision that’s going to have massive implications. It may have shortened Trump’s presidency—and it’s because of you, Jared Kushner!”

The screaming matches and white-knuckle showdowns continued. Eight days later, Priebus got an unexpected visit from the White House counsel—a story he has not told publicly before. “Don McGahn came in my office pretty hot, red, out of breath, and said, ‘We’ve got a problem.’ I responded, ‘What?’ And he said, ‘Well, we just got a special counsel, and [Attorney General Jeff] Sessions just resigned.’ I said, ‘What!? What the hell are you talking about?’ ”

The piece is an adaptation from the forthcoming paperback edition of The Gatekeepers by Chris Whipple.

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

You are reading the free version of Political Wire.

  • If you enjoy it, become a member to get many great benefits.
  • If you're already a member, log in to get the full experience.

Priebus Disputes Trump Tried to Fire Mueller

February 5, 2018 at 8:46 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Former Trump White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus disputed reports that Trump sought to fire special counsel Robert Mueller, NBC News reports.

Said Priebus: “Of all the things that we went through in the West Wing, I never felt that the president was going to fire the special counsel.”

First Read: “But note how Priebus repeatedly used the word ‘felt’ in the interview. As Hugh Hewitt described it on Meet the Press after the Priebus interview, ‘You can’t perjure yourself if you feel something. If you don’t remember something you can’t perjure yourself. So he’s been lawyered up. He’s obviously feeling like he’s not a target and he’s in the clear.'”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus, Robert Mueller

Priebus Interviewed by Mueller’s Investigators

October 13, 2017 at 6:52 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus was interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team on Friday, Politico reports.

“Priebus is seen as a key player in understanding the president’s actions because he was present for many meetings, including discussions on firing Comey and White House meetings with Russian officials. He also was privy to White House internal documents.”

[alert type=”general” dismiss=”no”]It was probably just a coincidence that Trump invited Priebus to lunch last week “in what is one of their few in-person meetings since Priebus was driven out of the administration more than two months ago.”[/alert]

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Fired Aides Still at the White House

August 26, 2017 at 8:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “Priebus, these people said, told people he was staying around even after he publicly said he resigned and flew to Long Island on Air Force One, a strange move if one had already resigned… Regardless, he wandered around the halls of the Executive Office Building for days, taking occasional meetings, looking for other gigs and taking a vacation before his employment formally concludes at the end of August. Priebus declined to comment.”

“No one is exactly sure what Spicer is doing these days at the White House; he quit five weeks ago but is still there while negotiating his next gig and meeting with TV networks, while staying on the payroll.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus, Sean Spicer

Mueller Now Wants to Talk to Reince Priebus

August 12, 2017 at 3:42 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“In a sign that the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election will remain a continuing distraction for the White House, special counsel Robert Mueller is in talks with the West Wing about interviewing current and former senior administration officials, including the recently ousted White House chief of staff, Reince Priebus,” the New York Times reports.

“Mr. Mueller has asked the White House about specific meetings, who attended them and whether there are any notes, transcripts or documents about them… Among the matters Mr. Mueller wants to ask the officials about is President Trump’s decision in May to fire the F.B.I. director, James Comey.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus, Robert Mueller

Inside the End of the Priebus Era

July 30, 2017 at 7:10 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “It was an ignominious close to an operatic six months during which Priebus was sidelined from the outset, first by chief strategist Steve Bannon, then by Trump’s children and finally by Anthony Scaramucci, whose arrival last week as communications director heralded the imminent end of Priebus’ tenure.”

“But finally it was the absence of progress on Trump’s legislative agenda—health care, taxes, infrastructure—that prompted the president, in consultation with his family, to finally tell people around him it was time ‘to try a different approach,’ said one senior administration official.”

Said this person: “It’s hard to overstate how much the family had to do with this.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Priebus Wasn’t the Problem

July 29, 2017 at 12:05 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

The Wall Street Journal editorial page lets loose on President Trump:

Presidents get the White House operations they want, and Mr. Trump has a chaotic mess because he seems to like it. He likes pitting faction against faction, as if his advisers are competing casino operators from his Atlantic City days. But a presidential Administration is a larger undertaking than a family business, and the infighting and competing leaks have created a dysfunctional White House.

The reason Mr. Priebus wasn’t as effective as he could have been is because Mr. Trump wouldn’t listen to him and wouldn’t let him establish a normal decision-making process. Mr. Trump has a soft spot for military men so perhaps he’ll listen more to Mr. Kelly. He’d better, because on present course his Presidency is careening toward a historic reputation where names like Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon reside.

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Trump Once Asked Priebus to Kill a Fly

July 28, 2017 at 10:39 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

This is quite the anecdote from the Washington Post:

Trump’s demeaning of Priebus came through in other ways, too. At one point, during a meeting in the Oval Office, a fly began buzzing overhead, distracting the president. As the fly continued to circle, Trump summoned his chief of staff and tasked him with killing the insect, according to someone familiar with the incident.

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Why Anthony Scaramucci Hates Reince Priebus

July 28, 2017 at 4:26 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

The HuffPost has the details:

While preparing for his move into government, Scaramucci struck a deal — which is still under regulatory scrutiny — to sell his stake in his hedge fund, SkyBridge Capital, to Chinese conglomerate HNA Group and another company. He assumed that he’d be put in charge of the public liaison office, a job that Valerie Jarrett held in the Obama administration. He had it all mapped out, according to the White House adviser. He identified 2,500 influential business leaders across the United States and had come up with a clever name for them: Trump Team 2,500. He believed these people would help pressure Congress into supporting the president’s agenda.

But Scaramucci’s plans were foiled in early January. That’s when Priebus, according to a confidant of both Scaramucci and the president, told Trump, “He played you.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Anthony Scaramucci, Reince Priebus

Trump Authorized Scaramucci Attacks on Priebus

July 27, 2017 at 4:27 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Daily Beast: “White House officials and outside allies say the president is revelling in Scaramucci’s campaign against Priebus—undertaken through cable news appearances and a billow of tweets, some of which were subsequently deleted—and is thrilled to see a top staffer placing a publicly bombastic emphasis on White House leaks to the press, which consistently infuriate the president.”

Said one White House adviser: “The president specifically gave him the green light to go after Reince.”

BuzzFeed: “Privately, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, has told people that Priebus is ‘gone’ and that he is trying to figure out his next steps… Her message is that White House staffers who had come from the Republican National Committee, which Preibus ran before being named chief of staff, are out and the administration is ‘going back to Trump loyalists.'”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Scaramucci Sends Priebus a Message

July 27, 2017 at 7:17 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Just after Politico reported that financial disclosure forms from White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci show he may profit from his ownership in an investment firm despite moving to the White House, Scaramucci tweeted:

“In light of the leak of my financial disclosure info which is a felony. I will be contacting @FBI and the @TheJusticeDept #Swamp @Reince45…”

Ryan Lizza: “In case there’s any ambiguity in his tweet I can confirm that Scaramucci wants the FBI to investigate Reince for leaking.”

Washington Post: “Some in White House are trying to build a case that Priebus is a leaker — ‘a diagram’ charting leaks, per senior official — to show Trump.”

Apparently unknown to Scaramucci: His financial disclosure is a public document.

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Anthony Scaramucci, Reince Priebus

Reince Priebus Marginalized

July 26, 2017 at 8:30 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Washington Post: “Typically, the job of firing staffers — even those in the press shop — would be left to the chief of staff, but Priebus has found himself increasingly isolated in recent days, with few areas of the White House reporting directly to him.”

The New York Times reports that Priebus “is still on the bubble and said to be looking for a graceful exit of his own.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

What Would It Take for Reince Priebus to Quit?

July 23, 2017 at 6:36 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Jonathan Swan: “President Trump knew that appointing Anthony Scaramucci as communications director would humiliate Reince, who fought hard against it. Scaramucci was smuggled into the meeting with the President on Thursday so Reince wouldn’t know about it. Trump had already taken pains to hide the discussions from his Chief of Staff, knowing Reince would try to foil the move. Trump also knew that inserting a line in the press release saying Scaramucci would report directly to the President — doing an end-run around Reince — was perhaps an unendurable public humiliation.”

“Reince has very few true allies inside the building. At this point, they don’t stretch much further than his personal assistant and the RNC holdovers on the press team. At the senior level, the only WH official who will go to the mat for Reince’s survival is Steve Bannon. They’ve become allies of convenience in a feud against Jared and Ivanka.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Priebus Keeps Tight Grip on RNC

June 22, 2017 at 7:19 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “Priebus, who led the RNC from 2011 until he assumed the White House job earlier this year, has so far given little autonomy to his successor, Ronna Romney McDaniel, with one senior Republican operative close to the White House saying Priebus’ control over the RNC is ‘total and complete.'”

“Priebus wants to be continually updated on fundraising numbers, potential candidates for office and polling numbers, according to one strategist with knowledge of the RNC.”

Filed Under: Republicans, White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus, Ronna Romney McDaniel

Trump Gives Priebus Deadline to Fix White House

June 11, 2017 at 10:35 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

President Trump “has set a deadline of July 4 for a shakeup of the White House that could include removing Reince Priebus as his chief of staff,” Politico reports.

“While Trump has set deadlines for staff changes before, only to let them pass without pulling the trigger, the president is under more scrutiny than ever regarding the sprawling Russia investigation, which is intensifying the pressure on his White House team.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

Trump Wanted More ‘Slack Periods’

May 5, 2017 at 7:26 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

New York Times: “The signature image of Mr. Trump’s first 100 days in office, people close to the president said, is that of Mr. Priebus standing just inside the open door of the Oval Office, agitated and rolling his eyes, as Mr. Trump beckons another seemingly random gaggle of aides, friends, family, visitors, reporters — even the White House decorator — in for an unstructured chat or, worst of all, policy discussions.”

“Over time, Mr. Trump bridled and demanded the unstructured time he had so valued as an executive at Trump Tower. Mr. Priebus, who initially outsourced the details of Oval Office scheduling and paper flow to a deputy, has now taken over those tasks himself. He has reduced the pace of public events and, like a Montessori teacher, modulates structured work time with the slack periods Mr. Trump craves.”

Filed Under: White House Tagged With: Reince Priebus

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • Next Page »

Members get exclusive analysis, a trending news page, bonus newsletters and no advertising. Learn more.

Subscribe

Your Account

Sign in

About Political Wire

goddard-bw-snapshotTaegan 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.

Praise for Political Wire

“There are a lot of blogs and news sites claiming to understand politics, but only a few actually do. Political Wire is one of them.”

— Chuck Todd, host of “Meet the Press”

“Concise. Relevant. To the point. Political Wire is the first site I check when I’m looking for the latest political nugget. That pretty much says it all.”

— Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report

“Political Wire is one of only four or five sites that I check every day and sometimes several times a day, for the latest political news and developments.”

— Charlie Cook, editor of the Cook Political Report

“The big news, delicious tidbits, pearls of wisdom — nicely packaged, constantly updated… What political junkie could ask for more?”

— Larry Sabato, Center for Politics, University of Virginia

“Political Wire is a great, great site.”

— Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”

“Taegan Goddard has a knack for digging out political gems that too often get passed over by the mainstream press, and for delivering the latest electoral developments in a sharp, no frills style that makes his Political Wire an addictive blog habit you don’t want to kick.”

— Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post

“Political Wire is one of the absolute must-read sites in the blogosphere.”

— Glenn Reynolds, founder of Instapundit

“I rely on Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire for straight, fair political news, he gets right to the point. It’s an eagerly anticipated part of my news reading.”

— Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist.

Copyright © 2023 · Goddard Media LLC | Privacy Policy

Political Wire ® is a registered trademark of Goddard Media LLC