THE GENERAL STAYS – AT 12:30 P.M. ET:   The rumors were rampant.  Gen. John Kelly, White House chief of staff, was on his way out.  No question about it.  Publishers salivated over a tell-all book about the evil TRUMP (!!!!) or PENCE (!!!).

Uh, not so fast.  From Reuters: 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House Chief of Staff John Kelly plans to stay in his post through the presidential election until 2020, a White House official told Reuters, putting to rest months of speculation that the retired military general would be the next to leave U.S. President Donald Trump’s inner circle.

The news of Kelly staying on was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, which said that Kelly told White House staff on Monday that Trump had asked him to remain in the position and he agreed.

Kelly had been widely expected to depart the post sometime this summer. Trump has occasionally chafed at the restrictions Kelly has placed on who has access to see him, and had considered replacing Kelly with Mick Mulvaney, the White House budget director, or Nick Ayers, the chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence.

COMMENT:  This is good.  It provides an aura of stability to an administration that is regularly ridiculed as chaotic, which it is not.

Should Kelly ultimately reverse his decision, Trump could bring in Bernie Sanders to give him some experience.

July 31, 2018