Hours after President Trump told his Twitter followers to "stop reading" news articles that are based on "fictional" anonymous sources, he confirmed an anonymous report that White House Counsel Don McGahn would be leaving his position in the fall.

McGahn was just as surprised as anyone to see the tweet, The Washington Post reported Wednesday. McGahn "will be leaving his position in the fall, shortly after the confirmation (hopefully) of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court," Trump tweeted. "I have worked with Don for a long time and truly appreciate his service!" But McGahn reportedly hadn't discussed his plans to leave with Trump yet and wasn't aware that Trump was about to post a tweet about the move.

"He was surprised," a source told the Post, explaining McGahn's shock at seeing his unannounced exit plan trumpeted to Trump's 54 million Twitter followers. But the White House counsel has worked with Trump long enough to expect the unexpected — he has reportedly taken an attitude of "of course it happened this way" when it comes to the president's ability to astound. Read more at The Washington Post. Summer Meza

If Jennifer Senior could go back to the summer of 2017, she would have written a very different review of the book Conscience of a Conservative.

Senior, now a New York Times opinion columnist, was a book critic when Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) released his tome. In the Times on Tuesday, Senior writes that she gave the book a "mostly kind review," but now, she's "seriously reconsidering" it. Flake has "always been a class act," Senior said, and she applauded him for being the first Republican senator to "call President Trump the domestic and international menace that he is." But while Flake loudly asserted that he was standing up to Trump, he still went along and voted with the president 84 percent of the time. "Jeff Flake's book couldn't even convince Jeff Flake," Senior said.

Flake may have said he really, truly believed Trump posed a threat to democracy, but his voting record paints a different picture. Flake had ample opportunities to "align himself with the opposition," like the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who voted against repealing the Affordable Care Act. Instead, he said he had misgivings about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, yet still voted to confirm him. Trump is now the face of the Republican Party, Senior said, which is "heavy with nativists, populists, protectionists, assorted supremacists." Flake has urgently called for a return to the party's roots, but that has had "zero effect," and instead of his book being a critique of Trump, it "was a tragedy." Catherine Garcia

President Trump spent much of his Monday meeting with his legal team, going over questions from Special Counsel Robert Mueller and writing out responses, people close to Trump told ABC News Tuesday.

Mueller is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russian officials, and his questions for Trump center around Russian meddling, ABC News reports. Trump and his lawyers were expected to work on his responses during a Tuesday meeting as well.

So far, 32 people have been indicted by Mueller, with six pleading guilty — including Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn — and three sentenced to prison. Catherine Garcia

On Tuesday, Florida Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson's campaign filed a federal lawsuit to extend the statewide recount of last week's Senate race.

Nelson ran against Florida's current governor, Republican Rick Scott. Scott has a slight lead over Nelson, ahead by just .14 percent. By Florida law, when the top two candidates are within half a percentage point, counties must conduct a machine recount. That's been the case this month in the governor, U.S. Senate, and agriculture commissioner races.

The deadline for the recount is 3 p.m ET Thursday, which the Palm Beach County elections supervisor has said will be "impossible to meet," USA Today reports. Nelson's campaign said the lawsuit "seeks to allow all local elections officials in the 67 Florida counties the time they say is needed to finish a legally mandated and accurate recount because the race was so close." Catherine Garcia

When the House's newest members are sworn in this January, they'll join what will become the most diverse Congress in U.S. history. But most of that diversity, it seems, is coming from one side of the aisle.

With a wave of women and people of color winning their races last week, Democrats will have a majority in the 116th Congress, which is more than 60 percent "women, minorities and LGBTQ representatives," reports The Associated Press. Republicans' new House coalition, meanwhile, is nearly entirely white. A set of headshots shared by The Washington Post's Erica Werner makes that contrast very obvious.

Despite the increasingly diverse ranks, the majority of incoming House Democrats — 131 of the 228 decided seats, or 57 percent — are white, per USA Today. And of the 198 incoming Republicans, 191 are white, 96 percent.

Top House aides are actually less racially diverse than the legislators they work for, The New York Times reported. Just 13.7 percent of House staffers are people of color, a fact that likely prompted House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to launch a House diversity office on Thursday. It'll "help recruit and retain diverse employees to work in Congress," a Pelosi aide tells AP, and could be voted on as soon as the next Congress takes its seats. Kathryn Krawczyk

Juul announced on Tuesday that it will temporarily halt the sale of its flavored nicotine pods in all retail stores and will discontinue its social media promotions.

The e-cigarette company has conceded to mounting pressure from the Food and Drug Administration, as it completes the process of regulating the sales of e-cigarettes in convenience stores and gas stations, reports The New York Times. The hope is to curb the rise of teen vaping.

As of Tuesday morning, Juul has stopped accepting retail orders for its mango, fruit, creme, and cucumber flavored pods to over 90,000 retail stores. CNBC reports that customers are still able to buy all Juul flavors on its website, while the four tobacco and menthol-flavored pods remain in stores.

In a statement posted on the San Francisco-based company's website, CEO Kevin Burns addressed the purpose of this change. "By deterring social media promotion of the Juul system by exiting our accounts, we can better prevent teens and non-smokers from ever becoming interested in the device," he said.

The FDA is still set to release its proposal later this week, outlining strict requirements for age verification of online sales and restricting sales of cartridge-based flavored e-cigarettes to shops. “Our intent was never to have youth use Juul," said Burns. "But intent is not enough. The numbers are what matter and the numbers tell us underage use of e-cigarettes is a problem.” Amari Pollard

First lady Melania Trump on Tuesday called for a member of the Trump administration to be fired, and it looks like she may soon get her wish.

On Tuesday, the first lady's spokesperson, Stephanie Grisham, said in a statement that Deputy National Security Adviser Mira Ricardel "no longer deserves the honor of serving in this White House." NBC News reported earlier in the day that President Trump was likely to fire Ricardel following a "series of run-ins" with the office of the first lady. For instance, reports Bloomberg, Ricardel threatened to withhold National Security Council resources unless she or someone else from the NSC could travel with the first lady on her recent trip to Africa.

That's not all, though. Melania Trump's staff has told the president they believe Ricardel is responsible for leaking negative stories about her to the press, The Wall Street Journal reports, adding that Ricardel has feuded with Defense Secretary James Mattis as well. President Trump had reportedly already told his wife he would have Ricardel removed from office, the Journal reports. Her firing appeared to be imminent, especially because The Washington Post's Josh Dawsey writes that Ricardel is "among the most despised aides in the West Wing, if not the most." Ricardel was hired in May, and CNN reports she's one of National Security Adviser John Bolton's "key allies in the administration."

The statement from the first lady was particularly surprising considering, as CNN's Kate Bennett points out, Ricardel had joined the president at his Diwali ceremony right before its release. Not long after, the Journal reported that Ricardel had been fired and was escorted from the building, although a White House official denied this report, telling CNBC she is "still at her desk." When asked if she would still be there tomorrow, the official said, "We'll see." Brendan Morrow