With communications director Hope Hicks's departure, US President Donald Trump has lost another trusted aide. Hicks was Trump's longest-serving officer and her resignation is a big blow to him. Trump has been in office for little more than a year, but his office has constantly been under the cloud of scandal. Many other top aides, like Hicks, chose to leave their posts after cracks appeared in official relationships or were asked to leave as the president was unhappy with the way things were going. Very few of the original Trump team, which took over after the Obama administration, are left. Here is a list of those who were either fired or left the office.
Josh Raffel
Raffel was appointed the deputy communications director after he successfully handled communications for Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. He will resigning within the next month, citing family obligations. He wishes to return to the private sector.
Steve Bannon
Known as the architect of Trump's presidential campaign, and, later, his win, Bannon left the White House under severe stress. He was removed from the post of White House strategist after Trump became uncomfortable with Bannon getting all the credit for the election win. Time magazine's cover on Bannon calling him "The Great Manipulator" seems to have been the last nail in his coffin. Then came the protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, during which the disagreements between Bannon and Trump became clear. Bannon was also known for leaking information to the media about his rivals.
Reince Priebus
Within six months of becoming the chief of staff, Piebus was ousted from the post for failing to bring to order the chaos-ridden West Wing. Priebus's reign was riddled with infighting and the defeat of the Republican Health Bill. His opposition to Anthony Scaramucci's appointment as communications director also led to his downfall.
Michael Flynn
Flynn's lies led to his fall. He admitted to passing "incomplete information" regarding telephone calls he had with Russian ambassador about American sanctions against Russia. He said that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence and other White House officials about his conversations to the ambassador. Flynn had served for less than a month as the national security adviser.
Rob Porter
Porter was the staff secretary when he resigned from the White House. His ex-wives had publicly accused him of physically and emotionally abusing them. Porter has continued to claim the allegation as false. Hope Hicks was linked with Porter and the duo were reportedly dating when the allegations became public.
Sally Yates
Yates was part of the Obama administration and was fired by Trump when she, as the acting attorney general, refused to defend Trump's travel ban on citizens from seven Muslim majority countries.
Katie Walsh
When the initial effort to repeal Obamacare ended in defeat, then deputy chief of staff Walsh left the White House for another job—to run a pro-Trump group. She was just two months into the job and was considered then chief of staff Priebus's closest ally.
Tom Price
The health and human services secretary resigned when scandal broke out that he had travelled using chartered flights that cost thousands of taxpayers money. Price, 62, took more than two dozen private flights at taxpayers' expense as well as trips to Europe, Africa and Asia on military aircraft, at a cost of more than $1 million.
Brenda Fitzgerald
Conflicts of interest forced Fitzgerald to step down from the post of director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She had heavy financial investments in tobacco industry, a leading cause of preventable death.
Anthony Scaramucci
This communications director was fired for his profanity-laced tirade against other official staff during a phone call with a reporter. Number of days at work—11.
Sean Spicer
Spicer was another opposer to Scaramucci's appointment. He was the first press secretary to the Trump administration and left in July 2017.
Michael Dubke
Barely three months of being hired, Dubke, who was hired as communications director to revamp the White House media strategy, resigned. He quoted personal reasons in his mail to his friends for leaving the job.
Michael Short
This senior assistant press secretary officially resigned from his position after Anthony Scaramucci revealed that he was planning to dismiss Short for allegedly leaking information.
James Comey
Comey's dismissal was one of the most controversial send-offs from the White House. As the seventh director of Federal Bureau of Investigation, Comey was criticised for his handling of the FBI's investigation of the Hillary Clinton email controversy and for the FBI's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 US elections.
Andrew McCabe
The Russian interference investigation had another casualty. McCabe was the acting FBI director and he stepped down amid criticism of the investigation into the Russia probe.
Sebastian Gorka
Gorka, who was the national security and counterterrorism expert, stepped down after sending out a warning of internal forces that do not support the "MAGA promise"—Make America Great Again campaign, which was Trump's clarion call during his campaign.
Walter Shaub
Shaub, who was the ethics director for other administrations, too, denounced the Trump office and its conflicts of interests far too many times. He stepped down from his post and became a much louder voice in calling out Trump's failings.
Omarosa Manigault Newman
The "Apprentice" star landed a job as an aide in the White House. But whether she was "let go" or she resigned is still not clear.
Derek Harvey
This top Middle East adviser to Trump was ousted so that his boss could replace him with his own man. Harvey was viewed as one of Trump’s more hawkish foreign policy advisers—particularly on Iran.
Dina Powell
Apparently it was always her plan to depart after a year of service. So, Powell, who was a deputy national service adviser with specialisation in the Middle East, left in early 2018.
