The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forceful chief of staff grates on Trump; the feeling is mutual
President bridles at Kelly’s attempts at management.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump was in an especially ornery mood after staff members gently suggested he refrain from injecting politics into day-to-day issues of governing after last month’s raucous rally in Arizona, and he responded by lashing out at the most senior aide in his presence.
It happened to be his new chief of staff, John Kelly.
Kelly, the former Marine general brought in five weeks ago as the successor to Reince Priebus, reacted calmly, but he later told other White House staff members that he had never been spoken to like that during 35 years of serving his country. In the future, he said, he would not abide such treatment, according to three people familiar with the exchange.
While Kelly has quickly brought some order to a disorganized and demoralized staff, he is fully aware of the president’s volcanic resentment about being managed, according to a dozen people close to Trump, and has tread gingerly through the minefield of Trump’s psyche. But the president has still bridled at what he perceives as being told what to do.
Like every other new sheriff in town Trump has hired to turn things around at the White House or in his presidential campaign, Kelly has gradually diminished in his appeal to his restless boss. What is different this time is that Trump, mired in controversies and record-low approval ratings, needs Kelly more than Kelly needs him. Unlike many of the men and women eager to work for Trump over the years, the new chief of staff signed on reluctantly, more out of a sense of duty than a need for affirmation, personal enrichment or fame.
“It is inevitable that a guy who will not be contained and does not want to be handled or managed was going to rebel against the latest manager who wanted to control him,” said Roger Stone, a longtime Trump adviser, who believes Kelly represents a kind of management coup by “the triumvirate” of two powerful retired generals — Kelly and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis — and one general who is still in the Army, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster.
“Ultimately Donald Trump is his own man, and he’s going to resist all the control and regimented systems Kelly is trying to impose,” Stone said.
For the seven months of the Trump administration, the favorite parlor game in the West Wing has been guessing how long imperiled aides like Priebus would hang on before getting fired. But these days it is Kelly’s state of mind, not Trump’s, that concerns the beleaguered aides buoyed by the new chief ’s imposition of structure and clear lines of authority.
The question now is how long Kelly will stay, with estimates ranging from a month to a year at the most. White House officials say Kelly has given no indication he intends to leave anytime soon. He has thrown himself into longterm planning of the administration’s tax reform push, the president’s Asia trip in November and scheduling for the next several months, they said.
For Trump, few ingredients matter more in a staff relationship than chemistry, and at times he and Kelly — whose soldierly demeanor masks a slashing sense of humor — have enjoyed a mostly easy rapport. At commencement ceremonies at the Coast Guard Academy in May, Kelly elicited a big laugh from the president after Trump was presented with a ceremonial sword and Kelly told him that “you can use that on the press.”
Trump, who has said he has surrounded himself with former military men from “central casting,” respects Kelly, aides said. And the president has marveled at the installation of management controls in the White House.
“I now have time to think,” a surprised Trump has told one of his senior aides repeatedly over the last few weeks.
Kelly cannot stop Trump from binge-watching Fox News, which aides describe as the president’s primary source of information gathering. But Trump does not have a web browser on his phone, and does not use a laptop, so he was dependent on aides like Steve Bannon, his former chief strategist, to hand-deliver printouts of articles from conservative media outlets.
Now Kelly has thinned out his package of printouts so much that Trump plaintively asked a friend recently where the Daily Caller and Breitbart were.
Kelly has told his staff, time and time again, that his goal is to rationalize the chaos that has engulfed the management of the West Wing. Managing Trump is beyond his — or anyone else’s — powers, he has said repeatedly.
While Trump still reaches out to allies outside the administration — especially old friends and associates like Corey Lewandowski, a former campaign manager; Richard LeFrak, a fellow developer originally from New York; Bannon and a handful of others — more often than not it has been through the White House switchboard and not on his personal phone. And Kelly has usually listened in on the calls, according to two people with direct knowledge.
Even Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter, who has unfettered access to her father, has made a point of giving Kelly a heads-up if she is going to talk to the president about policy or politics, according to one of Trump’s friends.
Kelly has his critics outside the administration, notably Stone, who has accused Kelly of keeping the president from his friends and allies. He also has critics inside the White House, who have begun to complain that their access to Kelly has been limited.