The Wall Street Journal is reporting that John Kelly is expected to leave the chief of staff position shortly and that Trump is already engaged in the search for a replacement. Reports that Kelly was leaving began surfacing two months ago, when arguments between Trump and Kelly were the subject of several reports. The heat between the two doesn’t seem to be over anything so minor as Trump’s alliance-breaking foreign policy, or the cruelty on the border—an area where John Kelly fully agrees. Instead, Kelly and Trump have sparred over Trump’s inability to follow any sort of procedure, which reportedly led to Kelly calling Trump “an idiot.”
Though media often presented Kelly as the “adult in the room” keeping order in a chaotic White House, there is little evidence that Kelly ever held much power. And though Trump recently declared Kelly “one of the great chiefs of staff of all time” he continually bypassed Kelly in scheduling meetings, making calls, and otherwise handling items that generally fall in the chief of staff’s domain. Trump also frequently handed off items to others, including Jared Kushner, that normally would have been handled by Kelly and was reportedly upset when Kelly tried, even temporarily, to hold Kushner to rules regarding handling classified information. Kelly’s only real influence appears to be in reinforcing Trump’s tendencies to apply harsh and inhumane treatment to potential immigrants and asylum seekers on the border.
According to the WSJ, Kelly is likely to be replaced by Budget Director Mick Mulvaney, best known for his attacks on every program meant to help anyone with less than eight figures in the bank, and Nick Ayers, best known for running the largest pro-Trump PAC, and also being Mike Pence’s chief of staff on the side. Ayers in particular seems well-suited, as his experience is in promoting Trump for dollars, and basically not caring that he has nothing else to do.
Kelly’s first assistant was Kirstjen Nielsen, who Trump put in charge of Homeland Security. He was then backstopped by Rob Porter, who left the White House in 2017 after reports that he had physically abused two former wives.