The Trump administration is setting new records in a category where most presidents would rather be at the bottom of the heap.
Senior staff turnover in the current White House has reached epic levels, according to Brooks Institution senior fellow Kathryn Dunn Tenpas.
At least twenty-one top figures have quit, been fired or reassigned, she told The Wall Street Journal on Thursday. Dunn Tenpas tracked 61 bigwigs.
That ‘surprising’ 34 per cent brain-drain is more than in any other administration’s first year since at least Jimmy Carter’s.
President Donald Trump has lost more than one-third of his top-level aides and appointees, according to an analysis from a Brookings Institute fellow
Brain drain: Other than Vice President Mike Pence, none of the top-tier officials in this Oval Office photo from January 28 is still working in the White House. Pictured (L-R) are Trump, former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, Pence, former chief strategist Steve Bannon, former Press Secretary Sean Spicer and former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn
‘Not only is the percentage double, the seniority of people leaving is extraordinarily high,’ Dunn Tenpas said. ‘That’s unprecedented to me.’
‘The first year always seems to have some missteps on staffing, often because the skills that worked well running a campaign don’t always align with what it takes to run a government. In this case, it’s a president with no experience in government and people around him who also had no experience.’
Ronald Reagan saw 17 per cent of his senior aides head for the exits during his first year as president.
Bill Clinton lost 11 per cent and Barack Obama only saw 9 per cent head for the exits.
George W. Bush has the modern record for senior staff retention, shedding just 6 per cent in Year One.
Trump, though, prided himself on presiding over a presidential campaign that operated on a lean budget without a surplus of government-ready personnel.
And his inner circle is smaller than most presidents’.
Still arguing about it: former public liaison communications chief Omarosa Manigault Newman (left) and Bannon (right) insist they quit while White House insiders say they were let go
Sean Spicer, the television magnet who occupied the press secretary slot for six months, was among the shortest-tenured people ever to occupy that position
An unnamed ‘high-level GOP ally’ told the Journal that the president has a ‘lack of trust’ in ‘people he doesn’t know.’
‘But it’s also been the case that he makes snap decisions and winds up with people who are not great fits.’
One of those fast-made and quickly regretted hires, washed-out communications director Anthony Scaramucci, lasted just 12 days in the job.
And Trump’s short-lived first press secretary, the combative and truth-challenged Sean Spicer, spent just six months at the briefing podium.
That job has been a nearly three-year assignment, on average, since 1929.
Of the 31 White House press secretaries in that timeframe, only five served their presidents for shorter periods of time.
In the category of mission-critical Friends Of Donald, former Director of Oval Office Operations Keith Schiller – a longtime Trump bodyguard and security chief – left for greener pastures in September and hasn’t been replaced.
Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price and National Security Advisor Michael Flynn this year.
Former Steve Bannon left in August following a turbulent run as Trump’s chief strategist. He has told media outlets he quit. White House insiders say he was kicked out.
Sebastian Gorka, a close Bannon deputy, followed him out weeks later.
Longtime Trump bodyguard Keith Schiller quit the White House in September to seek a higher salary in the private sector
Angella Reid was the White House Chief Usher since 2011 but found herself on the outside after Trump moved in
Other high-profile losses in 2017 include Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and his deputy Katie Walsh; Office of Public Liaison Director George Sifakis and his communications chief Omarosa Manigault Newman.
A senior administration official said last week that the White House still has a solid team in place.
‘Is it a mistake to have to fire people? You’re asking, did he make a mistake in hiring them in the first place? You have to be more specific about people,’ the official told reporters.
‘I know we love to learn the more generic points of palace intrigue than the finer points of policy sometimes, but we have a really good team here. And we have a team that is very well managed by the chief of staff.’