Top Cabinet officials are fretting about whether they will be the next person fired by Donald Trump after Pam Bondi was unceremoniously booted from her job as attorney general.
After Bondi followed former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem out the door on Thursday, senior administration officials and department heads were “anxiously eyeing their phones” to see if they would be the next purge victim, The Atlantic reported.
The erratic 79-year-old president is said to already be weighing who to fire next as he searches for new people to blame for his disastrously low poll ratings.
The magazine reports that there have been “active discussions” about removing FBI Director Kash Patel, Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll, and Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer.
Patel, a former MAGA podcaster, has faced constant criticism for his performance leading the FBI, as well as concerns that he is more focused on social media clout than on law enforcement work.
Patel also caused embarrassment when he was filmed celebrating and downing beers with the U.S. men’s Olympic ice hockey team in the locker room following their gold-medal victory over Canada during what was supposed to be a taxpayer-funded work trip to Milan.
Trump was said to have originally wanted to wait until after the midterms—when the GOP is expected to suffer heavy losses—before deciding whether to fire Cabinet officials.
However, the increasingly panicked president is reportedly making moves now amid concerns it would be nearly impossible to confirm replacements if Democrats retake control of the Senate in November.
Trump’s decision to fire Bondi came after he was buoyed by the positive reaction to his earlier decision to remove the constantly embattled Noem from leading DHS, The Atlantic reported.
Bondi has also faced bipartisan criticism for her tenure as attorney general, including for her role in the botched handling of the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.
She fueled accusations of a cover-up after telling Fox News in February 2025 that an alleged Epstein “client list” was “sitting on my desk right now” for review, before later stating that such a list does not exist.
Trump was also reportedly angry at Bondi over the Department of Justice’s failure to bring prosecutions against New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey as part of the president’s revenge tour.
“This has been festering across the administration for a while,” a source close to the administration told The Atlantic.
“It’s the Epstein stuff, partly. It’s also the critiques of the indictments, like Comey. It’s a general sense of WTF—she’s not logging a lot of wins, not clocking a lot of good media.”
On Thursday, it was also reported that Trump had asked his inner circle whether he should remove Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. Trump is said to have been irate with Gabbard for refusing to condemn Joe Kent, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who resigned over his opposition to the Iran war.
Speaking on the Daily Beast’s Inside Trump’s Head podcast, author Michael Wolff said he believes Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick could be the next Cabinet officials removed.
“This is now a set of dominoes,” Wolff told host Joanna Coles.
In a statement to The Atlantic, White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said: “Trump has the most talented Cabinet and team in American history. Patriots like Kash Patel, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, and Dan Driscoll are tirelessly implementing the president’s agenda and achieving tremendous results for the American people.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
