According to The Washington Post, President Trump is considering replacing White House Counsel Don McGahn, whose departure Trump announced via Twitter this week without McGahn's knowledge, with DC litigator Pat Cipollone.
This week, Trump interviewed Cipollone, a former Justice Department attorney who practices commercial litigation at Stein Mitchell Cipollone Beato & Missner, the people said. Trump is “strongly considering” Cipollone for the job, one person said.
Cipollone has been advising Trump’s outside legal team since at least June. He is also close to Emmet Flood, a White House lawyer who is helping handle the special-counsel investigation and is himself being considered for the top legal position.
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Trump tweeted Thursday he was “very excited about the person who will be taking the place of Donald McGahn as White House Counsel.”
According to the biography on his firm’s website, Cipollone has practiced in commercial litigation, trade regulation and health-care fraud. He has extensive expertise in defending corporations as well as handling complex federal investigations and “prepublication negotiations” over defamatory media reports.
He is a former partner at the law firm Kirkland and Ellis, whose attorneys have included [Supreme Court nominee Brett M.] Kavanaugh, Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork and former George W. Bush administration solicitor general Paul Clement.
Cipollone is well regarded among some of Trump’s senior advisers, including the president’s outside attorneys, Jay Sekulow and Rudolph W. Giuliani.
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Meanwhile, the White House Counsel’s Office has dwindled to about 25 lawyers, down from roughly 35 earlier in the administration, and many of Trump’s allies fear he does not have the staff or strategy to contend with looming legal challenges.
Flood is well regarded in the White House, but some Trump advisers would like to see him remain in his current position, focused on fighting off a potential subpoena from Mueller. Flood and Cipollone probably would work well together, according to people who know them.
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Cipollone’s firm was founded by a historic figure in the Washington bar — Jacob A. “Jake” Stein, who won a rare victory during Watergate, securing an acquittal for a lawyer for President Richard M. Nixon’s reelection committee whose co-defendants were convicted.
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[Cipollone] also has a close bond with conservative commentator and Trump ally Laura Ingraham.