Priebus: Kelly should get to bottom of White House leaks

Outgoing White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said Friday he hopes his replacement John Kelly can “get to the bottom” of leaks coming out of the White House.

“I think that Gen. Kelly should see if he can get to the bottom of it and figure it out, but obviously unnamed sources are something that has been problematic and I wish him well and I’m going to try to help him,” Priebus told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer in his first interview since resigning.

As Blitzer began to ask if he was a leaker within the White House – citing accusations from newly named White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci this week – Priebus pushed back.

{mosads}

“That’s ridiculous, Wolf. Come on. Give me a break,” he said.

Scaramucci suggested this week that Priebus was behind a slew of leaks to the press coming out of the White House. 

“In light of the leak of my financial info which is a felony. I will be contacting @FBI and the @TheJusticeDept #swamp @Reince45,” Scaramucci wrote in a since-deleted tweet on Wednesday. 

Scaramucci went on to blast Priebus in an interview with The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza on Wednesday night, calling the then-chief of staff a ” f—— paranoid schizophrenic.” 

The communications director stopped short of apologizing on Thursday, saying he will refrain from using “colorful language” and that he made the “mistake” of “trusting in a reporter.”

I sometimes use colorful language. I will refrain in this arena but not give up the passionate fight for @realDonaldTrump‘s agenda. #MAGA

— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 27, 2017 

I made a mistake in trusting in a reporter. It won’t happen again.

— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 28, 2017

Priebus refused to return Scaramucci’s fire in his interview with Blitzer on Friday after Trump named Kelly, the director of Homeland Security, as his replacement on Twitter.

“I’m not going to because it doesn’t honor the president. I’m going to honor the president everyday, I’m going to honor his agenda, and I’m going to honor our country, and I’m not going to get into all of this personal stuff,” he said.