White House Communications in the Making

Trump's new communications director will be aggressive in reshuffling personnel to clean up the White House apparatus.

Mr. Anthony Scaramucci surrounded by reporters outside the White House on July 25. Photo: Reuters.

Anthony Scaramucci, President Donald Trump's new communications director, threatened on July 25 to fire the entire White House staff in an effort to stop the information leaks that have dogged the Trump administration since his inauguration, according to the Washington Post.

"I'm going to fire you all, that's what I do," Scaramucci declared. "You better stop leaking information, or you're fired."

The first person to leave the West Wing yesterday was senior assistant to the White House press secretary Michael Short. Short resigned hours after Politico published an article revealing that he was likely to be fired by Scaramucci as part of a mission to root out leakers.

“If you don’t stop leaking, I’m going to kick you off Pennsylvania Avenue,” Scaramucci told a small group of reporters on the White House grounds on the morning of July 25. “Do you want to sell postcards to tourists outside that door or do you want to work for the West Wing? What do you want to do? If you want to work for the West Wing, you need to stop leaking.”

Scaramucci joined the Trump administration despite fierce opposition from former White House press secretary Sean Spicer and White House chief of staff Reince Priebus. Spicer resigned to show his stance.

Scaramucci entered Mr. Trump's inner circle just four days after taking up his new position and was described as no different from a relative of the US President.

According to several sources inside and outside the administration, Scaramucci began vetting dozens of White House press and communications staffers. He met privately with advisers to President Trump to find out what they were contributing and to remove those who were not doing enough to protect the White House boss during crises.

Sources familiar with the matter said the crisis was looming because of tensions between Mr. Scaramucci and White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, despite their apparent unity.

Scaramucci has long complained to associates that many White House staffers are more focused on building Mr. Priebus's image than on protecting President Trump and promoting his agenda.

According to the Washington Post, inside the circle of allies of Mr. Scaramucci, there is currently an unofficial "black list" of names of White House officials who worked under Mr. Priebus and Mr. Spicer at the Republican National Committee.Katie Walsh, one of Priebus' deputies, was pushed out of the White House earlier this year, and now Scaramucci seems intent on isolating him even further.

Mr. Scaramucci is speeding up the restructuring of the administration because Mr. Trump seems to have lost patience.Sources said President Trump has given Scaramucci full authority to make changes. Typically, communications directors report to the White House chief of staff. However, Scaramucci is allowed to report directly to Trump.

Scaramucci said on July 21 that in addition to Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who was appointed as White House press secretary to replace Mr. Spicer, only Hope Hicks, White House communications strategy director, and Dan Scavino, social media director, were protected during the "cleansing" process. These two men are also close confidants of President Trump.

“Anthony has a lot of authority,” said Bryan Lanza, a former adviser to Mr Trump during the campaign. “We’re going to see a new communications team that’s more focused on pushing the agenda and protecting the president.”

Optimism and skepticism

Communications director Scaramucci walks behind new White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders during a press briefing on July 21. Photo: AP.

Inside the White House, after Spicer resigned and Scaramucci officially took over, the atmosphere began to stir. Some people were excited and optimistic that this would be a "new beginning". But many were skeptical, according to the Washington Post.

The question now is whether Mr. Scaramucci can truly avert a crisis in the White House, especially when President Trump has yet to show he is willing to change his behavior.

"The White House's communications problems stem largely from the president's constant deviation from the plan and undermining good messaging with controversial tweets on social media," said Ryan Williams, a Republican strategist.

According to Williams, who the communications team is is less important than the President's self-restraint and consistency with the messages he sends. "Anthony Scaramucci may be able to convince the President to stick to the messages he wants to send, but I only believe it when I see it happen," he said.

Scaramucci wants the communications team to serve only one client: President Trump. He is looking outside the White House for new advisers with expertise, especially in television.

People briefed on Scaramucci's plans say the White House communications director is also considering bringing in corporate communications experts and people familiar with television broadcasting.

Rather than developing a communications strategy to limit President Trump's public comments, Scaramucci may be trying to spread the populist ideology and combative image of the White House boss.

“You can adapt Trump to the presidency or you can adapt the presidency to Trump,” said Barry Bennett, a former campaign adviser to the US president. “I think the latter is the only viable option.”

For the past two months, all Spicer has done is block the media from broadcasting the almost daily press briefings at the White House. Critics say this is Spicer’s strategy to survive as White House press secretary, because without televised press briefings, President Trump cannot watch them and criticize him.

But on July 24, as White House communications director, Scaramucci sent out a message that he would go against Spicer. On Twitter, Scaramucci declared: "The TV cameras are back."

According to VNE