WASHINGTON — Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe was set to resign in a few days when Attorney General Jeff Sessions abruptly fired him. Sessions said that McCabe “lacked candor” when talking to internal investigators about an inquiry related to former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
In a statement released Friday, McCabe denied the allegations. He also had harsh words for the president. “For the last year and a half, my family and I have been the targets of an unrelenting assault on our reputation and my service to this country,” he wrote. “The President’s tweets have amplified and exacerbated it all.”
Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wisc., offered McCabe a job in an attempt to help the former deputy FBI director retain his pension. “He deserves the full retirement that he has been promised, not to have it taken away as a result of the President’s political games,” Pocan said in a statement.
McCabe’s abrupt departure is part of an avalanche of high-profile exits at the White House and throughout the Trump Administration. Since the inauguration, high turnover in key positions — including Cabinet secretaries, chiefs of staff, and communications directors — has characterized Trump’s presidency.
A timeline of these departures shows a constant stream of top advisers heading out the door. From Sally Yates’ firing in January 2017 to Friday’s firing of Andrew McCabe, tumultuousness seems very much the norm in Trump’s White House.
According to Brookings Institution director Paul Light, the factors that led to turnover at the beginning of Trump’s presidency have not gone away. “[Trump] still doesn’t have good connections to Republican ranks, he doesn’t respect intelligencia on the right, he still doesn’t have good advice from seasoned leaders who’ve had past experience.”
It’s not just that Trump doesn’t connect with established Republican staffers, Light says, it’s that he doesn’t want to. “Staff are merely placeholders in his administration… when he said, ‘Only I can change this world,’ he really did mean himself and no staff.”
The one thing that does seem certain in an unpredictable presidency, therefore, is that high turnover is likely to continue. The only question that remains is which top official will exit next.