Anthony Scaramucci, the incoming White House communications director, told a reporter with the New Yorker that Reince Priebus, President Trump’s chief of staff, is a “fucking paranoid schizophrenic.”
In a phone call with Ryan Lizza, the reporter, Scaramucci accused Priebus of leaking and suggested he may ask him to resign.
Scaramucci also threatened to “kill all the leakers.”
“What I want to do is I want to fucking kill all the leakers and I want to get the President’s agenda on track so we can succeed for the American people,” Scaramucci told Lizza.
Scaramucci did not reserve his ire only for Priebus. He accused Steve Bannon, the White House chief strategist, of self-promoting himself.
“I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock,” he said.
Scaramucci also suggested his rant was not meant to attract media attention. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the President. I’m here to serve the country,” he said.
Lizza recounted his conversation with Scaramucci in a first-person story published in the New Yorker on Thursday.
Lizza said that Scaramucci called him Wednesday night to complain about leaks.
Scaramucci did not ask for conversation to be off the record or on background, Lizza said.
Scaramucci blamed Priebus for leaking details to Lizza of a Wednesday night dinner between Scaramucci, Trump, first lady Melania Trump, Fox News host Sean Hannity, and former Fox News executive Bill Shine.
Scaramucci also claimed Priebus leaked his financial disclosure form.
“They’ll all be fired by me,” he said. “I fired one guy the other day. I have three to four people I’ll fire tomorrow. I’ll get to the person who leaked that to you. Reince Priebus — if you want to leak something — he’ll be asked to resign very shortly.”
Lizza said Scaramucci pressed him to know who leaked details of the dinner.
“Who leaked that to you?” Scaramucci asked. “What I’m going to do is, I will eliminate everyone in the comms team and we’ll start over. I ask these guys not to leak anything and they can’t help themselves.”
Lizza said he refused to reveal his source to Scaramucci, but Scaramucci seemed to hone in on Priebus as the source of the leak.
“Is it an assistant to the President?” Scaramucci asked. Lizza wouldn’t say.
“O.K., I’m going to fire every one of them, and then you haven’t protected anybody, so the entire place will be fired over the next two weeks,” Scaramucci said.
Scaramucci claimed that he had asked White House officials to not leak information during his early days on the job.
“I’ve asked people not to leak things for a period of time and give me a honeymoon period,” he said. “They won’t do it.”
Scaramucci went on to say he would not be defeated by leaks.
“The swamp will not defeat him,” he said, talking of himself in the third person. “They’re trying to resist me, but it’s not going to work. I’ve done nothing wrong on my financial disclosures, so they’re going to have to go fuck themselves.”
