It didn’t take Mick Mulvaney long to line up another gig.
Fresh off his stint as acting director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, Mulvaney was named acting chief of staff to President Donald Trump on Friday. Mulvaney will also remain as director of the White House Office of Management & Budget, it was announced.
Mulvaney will replace John Kelly, who will depart as chief of staff at the end of the month.
A number of other candidates had turned down the job before it was offered to Mulvaney, including former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, and Nick Ayers, who is Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff.
One expert on White House chiefs of staff called the process “sad to watch.”
“In his first two years, Trump devalued the position by failing to empower anyone to perform the job, and now he’s turned the search for a replacement into a reality show,” said Chris Whipple, author of “The Gatekeepers,” a book on White House chiefs of staff. “The only thing more broken and dysfunctional than the White House itself seems to be the search for the new White House chief of staff.”
Mulvaney spent a year as acting director of the BCFP while still running the OMB, splitting his time between the two agencies. It was announced that Mulvaney will spend “all of his time” devoted to being chief of staff, even though he will not resign his OMB post.
Mulvaney is said to have built a rapport with the president, and will now be called on to use that familiarity to maintain order in the White House.
