I told you yesterday about the rumors of a White House shakeup, that included the possibility of both WH chief strategist, Steve Bannon, and WH Chief of Staff Reince Priebus getting kicked to the curb.
Then the news blew up on social media last night, with pro-Bannon factions pushing for the ouster of President Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, with the hashtag #FireKushner.
After a reported sit-down at Mar-a-Lago last night, in order to get Kushner and Bannon on the same page, or at least, off each others’ backs, the news from insiders within the White House has again shifted.
According to Axios, while Bannon, Kushner, and Priebus are all at Mar-a-Lago, hashing out their differences and trying to come to some happy medium, the fix may already be in.
For starters, the goal, now that Trump has comfortably settled in as president, is to pull the administration away from the hard right to the left, settling on some sort of centrist platform.
Chief of Staff Reince Priebus is fully on board with the changes to be made, making him safe with Kushner, therefore, safe in his position.
From Axios, however:
Steve Bannon, the engine and soul of President Trump’s hard-edged approach to his first months in office, is increasingly isolated and will be forced out unless he can adopt a more cooperative approach, a top source told me.
On both style and substance, Bannon got crosswise with Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, who are pushing for a more competence- and results-driven focus for the West Wing.
In their view, Bannon is too inclined to want to burn things down and blow things up. They want a more open process driven by the interests of the president, not ideology.
And the interests of the president will always coincide with what Kushner and Ivanka tell him his interests are, so Bannon may very well be packing up his collection of red ball caps and hoofing it back over to Breitbart.
Part of the report also suggests that there is a team effort among the New York players on Team Trump – namely Kushner, Ivanka, and Gary Cohn – to end any talk of Bannon having made Trump or of being an integral part of Trump’s successful run at the presidency.
This is a New York ballgame, through and through.
Bannon’s allies are attempting to make the point that to get rid of Bannon or diminish his role in any way could alienate President Trump’s core supporters – the alt-right nationalists.
That line of thinking actually has merit, as the hashtag #FireKushner was the top trending hashtag on Twitter for hours Friday night.
Time will tell if Axios’ sources are right.
This is going to get really interesting.
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