He started by threatening to fire the entire White House communications staff. It escalated from there.
.. “Who leaked that to you?” he asked. I said I couldn’t give him that information. He responded by threatening to fire the entire White House communications staff. “What I’m going to do is, I will eliminate everyone in the comms team and we’ll start over,” he said. I laughed, not sure if he really believed that such a threat would convince a journalist to reveal a source.
.. While they have publicly maintained that there is no bad blood between them, Scaramucci and Priebus have been feuding for months.
.. But Priebus didn’t want him in the White House, and successfully blocked him for being appointed to a job until last week, when Trump offered him the communications job over Priebus’s vehement objections.
.. Scaramucci, who initiated the call, did not ask for the conversation to be off the record or on background.
.. I asked him why it was so important for the dinner to be kept a secret. Surely, I said, it would become public at some point. “I’ve asked people not to leak things for a period of time and give me a honeymoon period,” he said. “They won’t do it.” He was getting more and more worked up, and he eventually convinced himself that Priebus was my source.
.. “They’ll all be fired by me,” he said. “I fired one guy the other day. I have three to four people I’ll fire tomorrow. I’ll get to the person who leaked that to you. Reince Priebus—if you want to leak something—he’ll be asked to resign very shortly.” The issue, he said, was that he believed Priebus had been worried about the dinner because he hadn’t been invited. “Reince is a fucking paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac,” Scaramucci said. He channelled Priebus as he spoke: “ ‘Oh, Bill Shine is coming in. Let me leak the fucking thing and see if I can cock-block these people the way I cock-blocked Scaramucci for six months.’ ” (Priebus did not respond to a request for comment.)
.. “They’re trying to resist me, but it’s not going to work. I’ve done nothing wrong on my financial disclosures, so they’re going to have to go fuck themselves.”
.. Scaramucci also told me that, unlike other senior officials, he had no interest in media attention. “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock,” he said, speaking of Trump’s chief strategist. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the President. I’m here to serve the country.” (Bannon declined to comment.)
.. “What I want to do is I want to fucking kill all the leakers and I want to get the President’s agenda on track so we can succeed for the American people,” he told me.
.. “O.K., the Mooch showed up a week ago,” he said. “This is going to get cleaned up very shortly, O.K.? Because I nailed these guys. I’ve got digital fingerprints on everything they’ve done through the F.B.I. and the fucking Department of Justice.”
“What?” I interjected.
“Well, the felony, they’re gonna get prosecuted, probably, for the felony.” He added, “The lie detector starts—” but then he changed the subject and returned to what he thought was the illegal leak of his financial-disclosure forms.
.. Scaramucci said he had to get going. “Yeah, let me go, though, because I’ve gotta start tweeting some shit to make this guy crazy.”
.. He changed his story about Priebus. Instead of saying that he was trying to expose Priebus as a leaker, he said that the reason he mentioned Priebus in his deleted tweet was because he wanted to work together with Priebus to discover the leakers.
.. Scaramucci then made a plea to viewers. “Let me tell you something about myself,” he said. “I am a straight shooter.”
The internal rivalries of the White House spilled out into stark public view on Thursday as President Trump’s new communications director publicly attacked the chief of staff, calling him a “paranoid schizophrenic” leaker and vowing to get him fired.
.. Anthony Scaramucci, who was installed as White House communications director last week over the objections of the chief of staff, Reince Priebus, in the morning called into CNN to say that the two men were at odds and to dare Mr. Priebus to deny being a leaker. By the evening, The New Yorker had posted an interview quoting Mr. Scaramucci using vulgar language to describe Mr. Priebus.
.. Mr. Scaramucci suggested that he believed that Mr. Priebus was leaking information to damage him. “Reince is a fucking paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac,” he said.
.. In the same telephone call, Mr. Scaramucci disparaged Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, who also warned against hiring him as communications director. “I’m not Steve Bannon. I’m not trying to suck my own cock,” he said. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the president. I’m here to serve the country.”
.. Mr. Lizza had posted a message on Twitter on Wednesday night reporting that Mr. Trump and Mr. Scaramucci were having dinner at the White House with Sean Hannity, the Fox News host and a strong supporter of the president, and Bill Shine, a former Fox executive. Mr. Scaramucci called Mr. Lizza unsolicited to demand that he identify his source.
.. When Mr. Lizza would not, Mr. Scaramucci said, “O.K., I’m going to fire every one of them, and then you haven’t protected anybody, so the entire place will be fired over the next two weeks.”
.. Mr. Scaramucci was also mad about a story on Politico reporting his financial disclosure form. In a Twitter post on Wednesday night shortly after his conversation with Mr. Lizza, Mr. Scaramucci said the “leak” was “a felony” and that he would be contacting the F.B.I. and Justice Department to seek an investigation. He then included Mr. Priebus’s Twitter handle, which several officials in the White House interpreted as meaning that he suspected the chief of staff.
.. On Thursday morning, he telephoned into CNN and agreed that he was at loggerheads with Mr. Priebus, comparing them to Cain and Abel, the biblical sons of Adam and Eve whose conflict led to Cain murdering Abel. He challenged Mr. Priebus to deny being a leaker.
.. But the leak he was complaining about was no leak. Lorraine Woellert, Politico’s reporter on the story, explained that she simply requested the financial disclosure form through normal channels and was provided it by a government agency as required by federal law.
.. “When I put out a tweet and I put Reince’s name in the tweet, they’re all making the assumption that it’s him because journalists know who the leakers are,” he said. “So if Reince wants to explain that he’s not a leaker, let him do that. Let me tell you something about myself. I am a straight shooter and I’ll go right to the heart of the matter.”
Comments:
And, by the way, please someone find the “hot list” of upcoming distractions to be used any day there’s a real agenda setback. Yesterday’s transgender military tweet kept us all away from watching the health care debate in America sink to new lows. Find and LEAK the outrage list so we can immunize ourselves to these “bright, shiny” issues beforehand, and not take our collective eyes off the cannonball coming straight at all of us. The Trump core base is said to be seeking revenge on the nation for their marginalization, but I for one am not going to be done in by lies, innuendo and profanity, even if it oozes out of the White House or the president’s own mouth.
.. Apparently what Donald Trump thinks saved him from all of his near catastrophes in business was hiring staff who pledged their undying loyalty and never told him the truth. But what that did instead was fuel his reckless behavior, and the only thing that saved him from ruin was the safety net of bankruptcy court. So now he’s repeating the same pattern, but there’s no bankruptcy court at the end of this road, just a Special Counsel.
.. Trump has a new friend in the White House. Someone who will spend any amount of time verbally caressing him, reflecting on Trump’s greatness and whispering sweet conspiracy in his ears.
Scaramucci and Trump are perfect together. Scaramucci will find the proof, gosh darn it, he will that the real and only problem of this Trump administration is the ‘deep state’ leakers. If The Mooch and Trump can round ’em up and punish them severely, then all will be right in Trumpworld.
When not searching for those leakers, Scaramucci will be wandering the White House in search of the government approval he needs for his big business deal.
He stands to make more than 90 million in selling his company when the government signs off. I am sure Trump will be able to smooth the path for The Mooch as long as The Mooch stays on course and hideously praises him every day.
.. The Mooch can navigate his way through the Sunday shows with a type of wit that charms the Trump base. He is combative, quick, witty, but knows absolutely nothing about the type of communication needed to create, trust and security. He will just add to the confusion and misinformation. Ironic that he is the White House Communications Director. Perhaps the title should be White House Spin Doctor. He is just another snake in the swamp right next to Conway and Bannon and Sanders — all MAGA soldiers doing Trump’s bigoted, dysfunctional bidding.
.. Scaramucci is a person in the same mold as Trump, which is why he was hired. He has no experience in government and has no intention to try to make the government look like it is functioning. The fact that he accepted this position, knowing the chaos Trump has created in just seven months, speaks to his naiveté. Just one more person in this alarmingly incompetent administration who has no clue, no professionalism, and no understanding of how government works. I don’t know how we can survive this administration unless Republicans and Democrats unite to stop the madness.
Mr. Trump asked Mr. Spicer to stay on as press secretary, reporting to Mr. Scaramucci. But Mr. Spicer rejected the offer, expressing his belief that
Mr. Scaramucci’s hiring would add to the confusion and uncertainty already engulfing the White House,
according to two people with direct knowledge of the exchange.
The president’s health care effort foundered in the Senate last week, and next week promises no respite, with his son
Donald Trump Jr. and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, due to testify before Congress on questions about their contacts with Russia.
His rapport with the president establishes a new power center in a building already bristling with rivalry.
The president has no intention of changing his behavior — he merely believes his communications staff needs to defend him better — and Mr. Scaramucci even suggested his role would be to unshackle an already unfettered president.
.. “We have accomplished so much, and we are being given credit for so little,” he said. “The good news is the people get it, even if the media doesn’t.”
.. He had hoped to last a year as press secretary. He quit after six months and a day.
.. The eventual appointment of Mr. Scaramucci was backed by the president’s daughter
Ivanka,
Mr. Kushner and the commerce secretary,
Wilbur Ross
.. Mr. Kushner has grown increasingly critical of both Mr. Spicer and Mr. Priebus, whom he regards as party establishment figures who operate out of self-interest.
.. Mr. Priebus and Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, both strongly opposed the appointment of Mr. Scaramucci — in large part because he enjoys an easy banter and direct line to Mr. Trump, potentially threatening their positions
Mr. Trump, aggravated by their opposition, dressed the pair down in a testy Oval Office exchange around the time he decided to offer Mr. Scaramucci — known in Trump’s circle as “The Mooch” — the job.
.. one of the reasons he hired Mr. Scaramucci was to cut down on anonymous leaking — and took a swipe at his two advisers.
.. He asked them how the leaks were happening, according to a person familiar with the discussions, and called Mr. Spicer a “good guy” who leaks only when told to by Mr. Priebus.
.. He is said to be especially high on Sebastian Gorka, a blustery foreign policy official who has been accused of having ties to far-right groups in Europe.
.. Mr. Priebus urged Mr. Trump to hire Mr. Spicer and another lieutenant, Katie Walsh, as deputy chief of staff. But Ms. Walsh left the White House after a short time when Mr. Kushner and other West Wing officials forced her out
.. In recent weeks, Mr. Trump had told people that Mr. Spicer was no longer “tough,” one of the harshest insults he can level
.. Mr. Spicer told friends he was tired of being blindsided by Mr. Trump, and weary of Mr. Trump’s constant criticism.
.. He instituted the highly contentious practice of holding off-camera briefings, less so to snub reporters than to avoid Mr. Trump’s critiques of his performance
In June 2017, he became a senior vice president and chief strategy officer at the U.S. Export-Import Bank.[4]
In 2008, Scaramucci served as a fundraiser for President Barack Obama.[31] In September 2010, Scaramucci asked Obama at a CNBC Town Hall meeting when he was going to “stop whacking Wall Street like a piñata.”[32]
.. He is a registered Republican and served as a National Finance Co-Chair for Mitt Romney for President in 2012.
During the 2016 presidential election, Scaramucci first endorsed Scott Walker and later Jeb Bush. In May 2016, after both Walker and Bush had withdrawn from the race, he signed on to Donald Trump‘s political campaign by joining the Trump Finance Committee.[34]
.. In January 2017, he told New York magazine that the “thing I have learned about these people in Washington is they have no money”, and described such congressmen as “jackasses”.[36]
.. They reported that Priebus opposed Scaramucci’s appointment because Scaramucci had a direct relationship with Trump.[6]
.. He is a member of the World Economic Forum and speaks at the annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland