'Coughgate' may have been the beginning of the end for Mick Mulvaney

President Trump's cough criticism was about much more than germs.

During an ABC News interview that aired last week, Trump's insistence that his Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney "leave the room" if he was "going to cough" stole the show. It's true that Trump is a "germaphobe who does not like shaking hands or being around sick staffers," and some staffers saw the incident as a reflection of that, Politico reports. Yet other Trump allies saw it as "the public airing of Trump's newfound irritation with his acting chief," Politico continues.

Mulvaney has been Trump's top aide since John Kelly departed at the end of last year, but still hasn't lost his title's "acting" designation. Yet White House staffers insist that doesn't mean Mulvaney will be ousted soon, seeing as Trump "likes the hands-off approach Mulvaney has taken to his schedule, whims and decision-making style," Politico reports. Instead, that not-so-temporary title, along with the ongoing insults, seem to be the president's way of "assert[ing] his dominance over an ally or staffer who Trump feels has gotten too big for his britches," Politico continues.

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Those pompous moves Mulvaney is allegedly making? Filling the West Wing with his former Office of Management and Budget staffers, piling his favorite aides onto Air Force One trips, and organizing three senior staff retreats to Camp David, to name a few.

Both Mick Mulvaney and outgoing White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders did not respond to requests for comment. Read more at Politico.