NYT: Trump Called Former Chief Of Staff Priebus To Complain About John Kelly

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus waits for Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos and US President Donald Trump to hold a press conference in the East Room of the White House May 18, 2017 in Washington,DC. ... White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus waits for Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos and US President Donald Trump to hold a press conference in the East Room of the White House May 18, 2017 in Washington,DC. / AFP PHOTO / Brendan Smialowski (Photo credit should read BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images) MORE LESS
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

President Donald Trump called his former White House chief of staff to complain about his current chief of staff this week, The New York Times reported Thursday.

According to sources close with Trump, Trump called Reince Priebus, who he pushed out to hire his current Chief of Staff John Kelly, to “confide grievances” over Kelly’s negative headlines this past week, according to the Times’ reporting. Priebus denied that the phone call occurred.

Kelly first came under fire this week for comments he made about the undocumented immigrants who qualify for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, some of whom he said are “too lazy” to sign up.

“(Some of them) were the people that some would say were too afraid to sign up, others would say were too lazy to get off their asses, but they didn’t sign up,” he told reporters Tuesday while discussing the White House’s immigration proposal on Capitol Hill.

The negative headlines continued Wednesday when Kelly released an initial statement of support for White House aide Rob Porter after Porter’s ex-wives’ allegations of patterns of domestic abuse became public. Kelly later corrected his original defense of Porter and called the allegations “shocking,” but the clean-up fell on deaf ears after it was reported that Kelly already knew about at least some of the abuse allegations. Porter’s background clearance check was stalled because both of his ex-wives told the FBI about their accusations of domestic violence.

White House spokesperson Raj Shah indicated Thursday that Kelly was unaware of the totality of the allegations until this week, specifically the photos that Porter’s first wife Colbie Holderness released of a black eye that Porter allegedly gave her.

Porter has denied the accusations but offered his resignation on Wednesday.

Latest Livewire

Notable Replies

  1. So the WH leaker was Reince ? Or is party-lines still a thing ?

  2. How much do you want to bet Trump pulled this same kind of shit with his various wives?

  3. Anyone else find this to be hilarious? He always wants what he doesn’t have.

  4. Avatar for erik_t erik_t says:

    Imagine being Prebius walking out of the festering swamp, shrugging meekly, saying to yourself “Well I didn’t really escape with my dignity intact, I didn’t really make a positive difference, I wasn’t really able to tame the beast, it’s frankly all going to hell but at least it’s over, at least I’ll never have to interact with that shambling dotard again”

    HAHA GUESS AGAIN, MOTHERFUCKER

  5. Or he probably just complained about his wives to his current girlfriend or porn star.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

82 more replies

Participants

Avatar for srfromgr Avatar for headhunter212 Avatar for clemmers Avatar for cervantes Avatar for steviedee111 Avatar for hccarey Avatar for daveyjones64 Avatar for serendipitoussomnambulist Avatar for dickweed Avatar for ronbyers Avatar for benthere Avatar for thunderclapnewman Avatar for clauscph Avatar for tsp Avatar for spencersmom Avatar for romi Avatar for marcc1213 Avatar for katscherger Avatar for thinski Avatar for erik_t Avatar for jakebarnes Avatar for redhand Avatar for the_loan_arranger Avatar for kenga

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: