Annie Donaldson, who served as chief of staff to White House counsel Donald McGahn, emerges in special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's report as one of the most important narrators of internal White House turmoil. Her daily habit of documenting conversations and meetings provided the special counsel’s office with its version of the Nixon White House tapes: a contemporary account of the president’s actions, albeit in sentence
March 2, 2017
“Just in the middle of another Russia Fiasco”
March 12, 2017
“POTUS in panic/chaos ... Need binders to put in front of POTUS... All things related to Russia.”
March 21, 2017
“beside himself ... getting hotter and hotter, get rid?”
May 9, 2017
“[n]ot [see the] light of day...[n]o other rationales”
May 9, 2017
Is “this the beginning of the end?”
May 9, 2017
“Resign vs. Removal. - POTUS /removal.”
May 31, 2017
“look like still trying to meddle in [the] investigation” ... “knocking out Mueller” … “[a]nother fact used to claim obst[ruction] of just[ice]."
May 31, 2017
“biggest exposure... other contacts....calls... ask re: Flynn”
Fuming that Attorney General Jeff Sessions plans to recuse himself from the Russia probe,President Trump calls McGahn and asks him to urge Sessions not to recuse. McGahn tells investigators he believes Trump feared a recusal would leave him unprotected and hobble his agenda.