Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer assured colleagues he has no plans to stick around longer than he has to, Politico reported on Thursday.
Spicer, who resigned in July in protest of President Donald Trump’s short-lived appointment of Anthony Scaramucci as White House communications director, announced at the time that he would stick around for several weeks for the sake of a smooth transition in Trump’s press shop.
By Tuesday Spicer had “made it clear” to colleagues, according to Politico, that he has no plans to hang around longer than that.
In the two weeks since his resignation, per the report, Trump’s former spokesman — who made his fair share of news during his embattled six-month tenure — “has been floating around the White House,” but aides told Politico that they don’t actually know what Spicer is doing all day.
Spicer’s rationale for resigning rather than dealing with Scaramucci was initially murky, but rapidly became clear after the newly minted communications director told a New Yorker reporter that he planned to “fucking kill all the leakers.”
One unnamed aide told Politico that “people were scared to go to work” under the foul-mouthed Scaramucci, who promised members of the White House communications team a clean slate, but allegedly had a list of former Republican National Committee staffers whose heads were on the chopping block.
“People were scared to go to work,” one aide said of Scaramucci’s short tenure.
In the course of his 10-day tenure, Scaramucci forced out Spicer and former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, but was then dismissed himself by Priebus’ replacement, John Kelly.
The one staffer Scaramucci did manage to fire in his whirlwind tour of the West Wing was former White House senior assistant press secretary Michael C. Short. Scaramucci told a reporter that he planned on firing Short, who in turn told reporters that he was unaware of any such “premise.”
Less than an hour later, Scaramucci blamed “leaking” for exaggerated reports of Short’s professional demise, and Short — a character in Scaramucci’s mold, who dismissed routine requests for comment as “gossip column inquiries” and once retorted, “Talking Points Memo has reporters?” — resigned hours later.
