Donald Trump’s original plan was for Jason Miller, a top member of the Republican’s campaign team, to serve as White House communications director. Miller, however, unexpectedly withdrew before Inauguration Day due to personal troubles, leaving Sean Spicer to serve as both the White House press secretary and the communications director, which never really made any sense, and proved untenable.
And so, a month after taking office, Trump hired Mike Dubke, the founder of a Republican consulting firm called Crossroads Media, to take over as communications director. This, evidently, hasn’t worked out well, either.
White House communications director Mike Dubke is stepping down from his post after just three months on the job, NBC News confirmed Tuesday.
Dubke tendered his resignation on May 18, but offered to stay on through President Donald Trump’s first foreign trip, which ended Saturday. Trump accepted Dubke’s offer, but his official last day has not been set and he was still expected to be at the White House on Tuesday.
Dubke’s resignation was first reported by Axios.
In case this isn’t obvious, it’s not a good sign when a chaotic White House, mired in scandal and tumult, loses its communications director — after just three months — despite the fact that he’s one of the few people in the West Wing whose professional background actually matched his job description.
We don’t yet have the details surrounding why Dubke decided to quit, but as a general rule, one of the surest signs of a White House in crisis is when prominent aides start fleeing. There’s also the added challenge of replacing Dubke. Under these circumstances, who’d leap at the chance of joining Team Trump as communications director? As for the growing list of Trump World departures, we can now update the overall tally. Note, some of the departures were voluntary, some weren’t.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
