Jim Watson | AFP | Getty Images
Newly sworn-in White House Chief of Staff John Kelly looks on in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on July 31, 2017.
White House chief of staff John Kelly met with administration staff on Friday morning to reassure them there would be “no immediate personnel changes” coming, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters at the daily press briefing.
She said Kelly’s message was that “people shouldn’t be concerned. We should do exactly what we do every day, and that’s come to work and do the very best job that we can.”
Kelly’s reassurances came at the end of a week marked by chaos at the highest levels of President Donald Trump’s administration, beginning Monday with the removal of Trump’s personal assistant, John McEntee, who was fired for “security reasons,” according to the White House.
On Tuesday, Trump fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with a tweet, and on Wednesday he named former TV commentator Larry Kudlow chair of the National Economic Council, replacing Gary Cohn, who had quit the week before.
On Thursday and Friday, rumors swirled of a coming “bloodbath” of more firings and resignations in the White House, including those of National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin and Kelly himself.