President Trump asks John Kelly to stay on as chief of staff through 2020
President Donald Trump has asked John Kelly to stay on as White House chief of staff through his 2020 re-election campaign, several White House officials confirmed to ABC News.
Two White House officials said Tuesday that Kelly told senior administration staff that he has accepted the president's request to remain on as chief of staff through 2020. At a separate meeting with Cabinet-level communications staff, a senior administration official said Kelly voiced his intention to stay on in the role for far longer -- through 2024 -- should the president be elected to a second term.
Another senior official told ABC News that the internal conversations about Kelly's future in the administration have been ongoing for several weeks and that the president and Kelly came to the agreement as previous tensions lessened.
The news that Kelly intends to stay on at the helm of the administration for the long haul comes just a day after Kelly passed the one year mark in the job as the president's second chief of staff.
A retired Marine general, Kelly replaced Reince Priebus in the role. Priebus, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, lasted in the job only for a matter of months, and the president's choice of Kelly to replace him was widely viewed as an attempt to establish order in the Trump White House.
Kelly has imposed stricter limits on who has access to the Oval Office, has cracked down on previously rampant leaks and reined in temporary security clearances.
Two months after Kelly moved into his job, the president declared him “one of the best people I've ever worked with" and predicted, “He will be here, in my opinion, for the entire seven remaining years."
President Trump has repeatedly offered public praise for Kelly and said he “could not be happier” with Kelly's performance in the job, even as there have been tensions between the two men from time to time during Kelly's tenure.
ABC's Katherine Faulders contributed to this report.
