Washington: Sean Spicer resigned as White House press secretary on Friday in protest over a major shakeup of US President Donald Trump’s embattled administration, an official told AFP.
Sarah Huckabee Sanders was named as the new White House press secretary Friday following the resignation of Sean Spicer, part of a dramatic major shake-up in President Donald Trump's inner circle.
Anthony Scaramucci, himself named the new White House communications director by Trump, made the formal announcement to reporters.
Spicer quit in opposition to Trump's appointment of Scaramucci, a Wall Street financier and longtime supporter of the billionaire investor-turned-president, a White House official told AFP.
In a brief statement read out by Sanders, a combative Trump said: "We have accomplished so much and (been) given credit for so little."
Spicer, the administration’s most recognisable face after the president, resigned after just six months in office, having been increasingly sidelined in recent weeks.
Spicer reached breaking point on Friday, the White House official said, when Trump appointed Anthony Scaramucci to be the new communications director, a bid to reset the scandal-wracked administration.
A source familiar with the deliberations told AFP Trump had tapped the New York financier and long-time backer over the objections of White House chief of staff and Spicer ally Reince Priebus.
The post has been empty since the previous communications director Mike Dubke resigned in May. Spicer had privately said he would like to do the job and play more of an off-camera role.
He has not briefed the press on camera for a month, deferring to his deputy Sarah Sanders.
The last six months have seen the Trump administration lurch from one crisis to the next, with Trump frequently expressing displeasure with the media coverage he receives.
Spicer — who came from the Republican party and was not an early Trump supporter — bore the brunt of much of that furry.
As an investigation into Trump campaign ties with Russia deepened, the White House has become a pressure cooker of internal strife, exhaustion and palace intrigue.
It remained unclear on Friday if Sanders and Priebus would stay in their roles.
Earlier on Friday, Trump’s legal team also got a shakeup as Trump came under fire for comments interpreted as seeking to limit a probe by former FBI director Robert Mueller into whether Trump associates colluded with Russia’s meddling in the 2016 US elections.
Mark Corallo, who coordinated the Trump legal team’s public response to the crisis, told AFP in an email that he had resigned from his post.
