WASHINGTON: White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci was forced out Monday after barely 10 days in his post, as Donald Trump’s new chief of staff asserted his authority on his first day in office.
John Kelly, who had served as Trump’s secretary of homeland security for six months, has been brought in as chief of staff to bring order and discipline to a White House beset by scandal, infighting, low approval ratings and legislative defeats.
After an Oval Office swearing-in ceremony, Trump confidently predicted the 67-year-old combat veteran — one of a group Trump has dubbed “my generals” — will do a “spectacular job.”
And Kelly got straight to work, as reports emerged that Trump dismissed Scaramucci — the fast-talking New York financier — at Kelly’s request.
“Mr. Scaramucci felt it was best to give Chief of Staff John Kelly a clean slate and the ability to build his own team. We wish him all the best,” the White House said in a terse statement.
Scaramucci had courted controversy with an expletive-laden attack on his colleagues — then Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, who was forced out last week, and chief White House strategist Steve Bannon. Kelly inherits the day-to-day running of a White House staff that — far from marching in lockstep — look like a regiment pinned down by heavy fire, getting conflicting orders from their commander and squabbling over the way forward.
“I predict that General Kelly will go down as, in terms of the position of chief of staff, one of the great(est) ever,” Trump said.
“What he has done in terms of homeland security is record-shattering, if you look at the border, if you look at the tremendous results we’ve had.”
Kelly replaces Priebus, a Republican Party operative who was ousted last week after the spectacular failure of Trump’s bid to repeal Obamacare and as his ugly feud with Scaramucci spilled into the open.
The chief of staff is the highest ranking White House employee — a chief operating officer who organizes staff, manages the president’s schedule and decides who gets access to him and when.
That is no small mission in Trump’s White House, where a rotating cast of family and staff with unclear roles and opaque job titles walk into the Oval Office seemingly at will.
Many question whether anyone can rein in the mercurial, Twitter-happy Trump, who has appeared to encourage the infighting among various factions vying for influence in his administration.
Trump — ever determined to project success — insisted Monday that there was no “chaos” at the White House, which was instead running as a finely tuned machine.
“I think we’re doing incredibly well. The economy is doing incredibly well, and many other things. So we’re starting from a really good base,” he told a Cabinet meeting.
Scaramucci out after 11 days as Trump communications director
Scaramucci out after 11 days as Trump communications director
Epstein files reveal links to cash, women, power in Africa
- Documents attest to Epstein’sclose ties with Karim Wade, son of former Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade
- They also reveal his ties to Nina Keita, niece of Ivorian president Alassane Ouattara
PARIS: Jeffrey Epstein built close ties with powerful figures in Senegal and Ivory Coast, files released by the US government last month show, detailing the late sex offender’s influence network across Africa.
Emails, scheduled meetings, investment projects, and loans reviewed by AFP attest to the disgraced New York financier’s close relationship with Karim Wade, son of former Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade.
They also reveal his ties to Nina Keita, niece of Ivorian president Alassane Ouattara.
Wade and Epstein met in 2010 through Emirati businessman Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, who recently resigned as CEO of port giant DP World after mounting pressure over his close friendship with Epstein.
The pair quickly struck up a rapport.
“Thanks for coming. I think there are many things to consider... I feel confident that we will have fun,” Epstein wrote to Wade on November 15, 2010 after their first meeting in Paris.
“Have a safe trip back to your paradise Island,” Wade replied.
While Wade’s exchanges show no link to Epstein-related sex trafficking crimes, they do reveal conversations on potential business ventures in various sectors, such as finance and energy.
Nicknamed the “Minister of Heaven and Earth” for the multiple portfolios he held including international cooperation, energy, and air transport, Wade was a powerful figure in Senegal until April 2012, when his father’s bid for a third term sparked deadly riots.
Epstein saw him as “one of the most important players in africa” and invited him to meet close contacts such as Ehud Barak, then Israel’s defense minister.
He also put him in touch with Chinese businessman Desmond Shum to discuss “offshore banking.”
The US Department of Justice documents show Shum and Wade met in Beijing on May 9, 2011.
That same month, Wade planned an African tour through Senegal, Mali, and Gabon for Epstein.
‘You will not suffer’
Epstein and Wade’s relationship became even more apparent after the latter’s fortunes reversed when his father left office in 2012.
That autumn, Epstein proposed that his “friend” — under the Dakar authorities’ scrutiny over his assets — use his house in Florida.
“You and your family are welcome to use my house in palm beach, staff is there, pool etc. you will not suffer,” Epstein wrote.
“Txs a lot Brother for the advise,” Wade replied a few weeks later to another email, in which Epstein urged him to “stay mentally strong.”
Numerous files suggest Epstein became financially involved on Karim Wade’s behalf after his arrest in 2013 and his 2015 sentencing to six years in prison for corruption.
Karim Wade’s lawyer, Mohamed Seydou Diagne, sent two invoices in May 2014 and July 2015 of $500,000 to one of Epstein’s companies.
Contacted by AFP on Monday, Diagne said he “did not consider it useful to comment.”
Other archives suggest that Epstein covered at least $50,000 in fees for the US lobbying firm Nelson Mullins, hired by Wade’s entourage to secure his release.
Epstein regularly exchanged emails with Robert Crowe, a partner at the firm who kept him informed of their efforts in the US and Senegal.
In a June 16, 2016 email thread where Epstein and Crowe discussed whether then Senegalese president Macky Sall would pardon Wade, Crowe writes: “He has told my friends high up at State that he was going to do it. They have been putting pressure on him!“
Karim Wade was released from prison eight days later, on June 24, and went into exile in Qatar, which he credited for efforts toward his release.
Jeffrey Epstein was told by Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem and Nina Keita.
‘A very interesting person!’
The DOJ documents show Nina Keita was close to both Epstein and Karim Wade and that she acted as a regular intermediary while Wade was in prison.
Keita also helped put Epstein in contact with her uncle, president of Ivory Coast since May 2011, and his team.
“He thought you were a very interesting person! ... they were all very happy to have you here,” she wrote on January 20, 2012, after the financier’s visit to Abidjan.
She had booked him the “ministerial suite” of the luxury Hotel Ivoire for that trip.
Ahead of the visit, Epstein had said he hoped to see “very pretty girls there, as well as interesting places.”
“You will!” Keita replied.
Emails show Keita, a former model, at least once sent photos and the phone number of a young woman to Epstein.
He then met this woman at the Ritz hotel in Paris on August 31, 2011.
“ask sadia to send pictures of her sister. i prefer under 25,” Epstein wrote to Keita after the meeting.
Now the deputy general director of Ivorian petroleum stocks company GESTOCI, Keita also appears in a February 2019 will in which Epstein requested that debts owed to him by a number of people be canceled upon his death.
AFP received no response to its requests for comment from both Keita and the Ivorian presidency, or from Karim Wade, who was contacted through his entourage.
The mere mention of a person’s name in the Epstein files does not in itself imply wrongdoing.
