Trump says White House Counsel Donald McGahn will leave his job in the fall

WASHINGTON - White House Counsel Donald McGahn, who has led the Trump administration’s efforts to reshape the judiciary while confronting turmoil in the West Wing surrounding the ongoing special counsel probe, has decided to leave the White House, President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday.

"White House Counsel Don McGahn will be leaving his position in the fall, shortly after the confirmation (hopefully) of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court," Trump wrote on Twitter. "I have worked with Don for a long time and truly appreciate his service!"

The exit of McGahn - a low-key, 50-year-old lawyer who has been a presence at Trump's side since the early days of the 2016 presidential campaign - comes at a fragile moment inside the White House as tensions between the president and the Department of Justice have escalated in recent weeks.

McGahn, who counts deep ties within Washington's legal community, has long functioned as Trump's liaison to Justice officials and frequently played the informal role of peacemaker as special counsel Robert Mueller and his team have pursued interviews and documents from White House officials as part of their investigation into Russian interference during the 2016 presidential campaign.

McGahn's coming departure is widely seen within Trump's circle as the culmination of frustrations that have come with each new crisis that he has been forced to handle since Trump took office, from a scandal over then-national security adviser Michael Flynn's disclosure of contacts with Russian officials to the many times the president has lashed out about Mueller's probe.

Still, McGahn has often expressed a sense of accomplishment to allies despite the controversies and turbulence, pointing in particular to his efforts last year around the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Neil M. Gorsuch and other judicial nominees later approved by the Republican-controlled Senate, as well as his work to curb federal regulations, as evidence of conservative success.

But McGahn's tenure has nonetheless been dominated by pressure-filled flash points where he has had to respond to the president's demands and deal with Trump's anger over what the president has called a "witch hunt." His decision to leave could prompt concerns among Republicans leaders about who will now be a calming and seasoned legal figure inside the Oval Office.

Since April, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani has been serving as the president's lead outside attorney focused on the Russia investigation and has been combative and public in his efforts as McGahn has stayed out of sight.

McGahn, particularly during the beginning of Trump's term, cautioned him about contacting Justice Department officials and even told associates he was concerned Trump was doing so without his knowledge. The two men would have "spectacular" fights, according to a person who witnessed some of them.

When Trump sought the firing of Mueller in June 2017, McGahn threatened to resign over the proposed move, according to two people familiar with the exchange. McGahn's warning to the president was first reported by the New York Times and denied by Trump, who called it "fake news."

Republican Rep. Charlie Dent, Pa., said in an interview then that McGahn "prevented an Archibald Cox moment," referring to the special prosecutor ordered fired by President Richard M. Nixon during the Watergate investigation.

In another showdown in March 2017, McGahn urged Attorney General Jeff Sessions to not recuse himself from the Russia probe. And last April, Trump asked McGahn to persuade the then-FBI director James B. Comey to announce that Trump was not personally under investigation, but failed to convince the Justice Department to do so.

McGahn's challenges have only mounted.

Sessions told the White House earlier this year he might have to leave his job if Trump fired Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who oversees the Russia investigation, according to people familiar with the exchange. Sessions made his position known in a phone call with McGahn, as Trump's fury at Rosenstein peaked after the deputy attorney general approved the FBI's April 9 raid on the president's personal attorney Michael Cohen.

Along with other current and former Trump aides, McGahn has met on multiple occasions with Mueller's team. Throughout that process, McGahn has had tense clashes with Trump's outside attorneys on Russia - as well as former White House lawyer Ty Cobb, who coordinated the White House's interaction with Mueller's team - questioning their cooperative strategy in the case.

As the White House Counsel's Office prepares for a revamp, Trump's outside legal team for the Russia probe is adjusting to a recent reshuffling, with Giuliani now on board, along with two former federal prosecutors. John Dowd, a veteran lawyer, resigned in March as Trump's lead attorney for the Russia investigation.

Led by Giuliani, Trump's latest legal team is taking a more antagonistic approach to the Russia investigation.

McGahn's struggles in the West Wing have not solely been related to Trump's conduct, but his own.

Earlier in the year, White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly and McGahn faced scrutiny over how they handled allegations of spousal abuse against Rob Porter, who resigned as staff secretary on Feb. 7.

Kelly, in a five-page memo directed to McGahn and others, later ordered changes to how security clearances are granted as part of the White House's response to continued questions about Porter, who had access to highly classified material months after the claims by his two ex-wives were reported to the FBI.

Within an administration that has had a strained relationship with the GOP, McGahn has been known on Capitol Hill and elsewhere as a totem of conservatism who was eager to remake the federal judiciary - veering each week from managing political and legal eruptions around Trump to private confabs with conservative allies and attorneys to talk through policy and nominees.

McGahn advised Trump to pick Gorsuch, then a Colorado appeals court judge, to fill the Supreme Court opening the new president inherited, and oversaw his confirmation. Trump came close to breaking the record for a new president having a nominee on the court so close to his inauguration.

McGahn also took a lead role in the administration's effort to transform the lower federal courts. Trump has seen 39 of his nominees already confirmed, more than doubling the total for President Barack Obama at the same point of his presidency. Twenty-one of Trump's confirmed nominees have been to the influential regional courts of appeals, far more than Obama was able to get confirmed early in his term. Some of those confirmed are on the list of those Trump said he will consider for the next Supreme Court opening.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has been a ready partner, and has pushed aside some of the stumbling blocks available to the minority party in the Senate. McConnell said recently he was ready to redouble his efforts to confirm judges before the midterm elections.