Trump Announces Don McGahn Will Leave White House In The Fall

Attorney Donald McGahn leaves the Four Seasons hotel in New York, Thursday, June 9, 2016, after a GOP fundraiser. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

President Trump on Wednesday morning announced that White House Counsel Don McGahn will be leaving his post in the fall.

Trump’s tweet confirms an early morning report from Axios that suggested McGahn was mulling leaving the White House either after Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court — a process he’s been heavily involved in — or after midterm elections.

McGahn’s departure could be centered on his opposition to Trump’s interest in pardoning his former campaign manager Paul Manafort. Trump and the White House counsel are reportedly at odds over the potential pardon of Manafort, who has recently earned Trump’s “respect” for not flipping on the President in exchange for a plea deal, like the President’s former lawyer Michael Cohen did.

McGahn surprised the President’s legal team earlier this month after the New York Times reported that he had been fully cooperative with special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe and had reportedly sat for 30 hours of interviews. Trump’s team was not aware of the extent of McGahn’s cooperation until the Times’ report was published and had to debrief with McGahn’s lawyers to find out what the White House counsel told Mueller.

McGahn would like to see Emmet Flood replace him as White House counsel, according to Axios. Flood was involved in both the Clinton and Bush administration and was hired to help oversee the Russia probe.

Trump has not yet landed on a candidate to replace McGahn, but senior officials in the White House would like to see Flood as McGahn’s successor as well, Axios reported.

Latest News

Notable Replies

  1. Avatar for spin spin says:

    continuing his tweet:

    “Don is hightailing his ass out of here before I do more crazy stuff that will get his law license pulled. I will be replacing him as White House Counsel with one of Rudy Gulliani’s crazy eyes.”

  2. Swear in the witness!

  3. Well, hopefully your ass will be out of the WH by then.

    Any closer yet, Mueller?

  4. Somehow I don’t think Emmett Flood will be his replacement … maybe Judge Judy is available. Or one of the judges from Law & Order.

  5. Doesn’t Dotard mean co-conspirator # 423?

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

91 more replies

Participants

Avatar for cassandram Avatar for littlegirlblue Avatar for sysprog Avatar for old_curmudgeon Avatar for steviedee111 Avatar for rollinnolan Avatar for winstonsmith Avatar for sickneffintired Avatar for longtimeobserver Avatar for dickweed Avatar for darrtown Avatar for tena Avatar for junebug Avatar for misterneutron Avatar for joriep Avatar for khyber900 Avatar for canyoncountry Avatar for dannydorko Avatar for maximus Avatar for erik_t Avatar for tompaine73 Avatar for gregor Avatar for occamscoin Avatar for staggerlee

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: