The Shulkin controversy erupted after the VA's inspector general reported the secretary used taxpayer dollars to pay for his wife to go to Europe.
Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin is warring with the Trump political appointees in his agency and has infuriated Kelly by playing his own press agent and repeatedly going directly to the media to declare he has authority to fire the disloyal staff. 
Here’s a sample of damaging stories from Trump’s cabinet:
White House officials quickly leaked that they were " alarmed," upset and dumbfounded by her performance. And on Sunday night’s "60 Minutes," Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who has largely stayed under the radar since her tortuous confirmation hearings, struggled to provide answers when asked for evidence to back up her school choice policies in her home state of Michigan. 
(A White House official tells Axios that the meetings weren't dress-downs, but "positive" discussions about "smart ethical judgment," and are expected to happen with all cabinet secretaries.)Įven the cabinet secretaries credited with policy wins for Trump - such as Attorney General Jeff Sessions with his hardline law enforcement policies, and EPA administrator Scott Pruitt with his aggressive deregulatory agenda - have either fallen out with Trump or caused unnecessary problems for senior staff.
As CNN reported, the White House held meetings last month with four cabinet-level officials to discuss damaging stories about questionable ethical behavior at their respective agencies. Kelly can’t fathom why cabinet secretaries keep making unforced errors that tar the administration and mock Trump’s claims that he hired “the best people” to “drain the swamp.”. Sources familiar with Kelly’s thinking say he gets especially aggravated by the stories of cabinet secretaries traveling in style on taxpayer funds: Why it matters: As we have said before, all habits, good and bad, flow down fast in any organization. It should come as no surprise that cabinet officials are improvising, understaffed, and are ignoring precedent, procedures and in some cases the law. The problems go far beyond Rex Tillerson, who clashed with Trump repeatedly before being fired today in favor of CIA Director Mike Pompeo. 
Coming into office, President-elect Trump boasted his cabinet had “by far the highest IQ of any cabinet ever assembled.” But these days, Trump and his chief of staff John Kelly are more likely to privately question the basic intelligence of their cabinet officials than shower them with such praise.
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