Priebus is out: Trump tweets he’s named a new chief of staff

Donald Trump just tweeted that he’s named Homeland Security director John F. Kelly as chief of staff, calling Kelly a “true star of my administration.” Because that’s how government works now.

According to the New York Times, Priebus was forced out within hours of this morning’s disastrous defeat of Trump’s push to repeal Obamacare.

The announcement capped a fraught 24 hours in which the president’s advisers waited for a change they had long anticipated. Mr. Priebus accompanied Mr. Trump on Air Force One for a day trip to Long Island as his fate was being decided. Making for a tense flight, his rival, Anthony Scaramucci, the communications director who had publicly vowed to force Mr. Priebus’s resignation, was also on the plane and in the motorcade.

In barely half a year on the job, Mr. Priebus never won the full confidence of the president nor was granted the authority to impose a working organizational structure on the West Wing. Always seeming to be on the edge of ouster, Mr. Priebus saw his fate finally sealed a week ago when Mr. Trump hired Mr. Scaramucci, an edgy Wall Street financier, over the chief of staff’s objections. Mr. Priebus’s ally, Sean Spicer, the press secretary, resigned in protest.

This story will be updated as more facts come in.