But Trump’s chief of staff considers her a surrogate daughter – she spent last Christmas with his family – and helped her secure the DHS job last December.

The president made his own attitude towards her clear in the first Cabinet meeting she attended as an official member of the Cabinet shortly after her confirmation in early December of last year. Trump used the occasion to recount Kelly’s successes at DHS and, in particular, how border crossings were historically low under his leadership. “I sure hope Kirstjen’s tough enough,” Trump said, according to one meeting attendee.

But Kelly’s status in the White House has changed in recent months, and he and the president are now seen as barely tolerating one another. According to four people close to Kelly, the former Marine general has largely yielded his role as the enforcer in the West Wing as his relationship with Trump has soured. While Kelly himself once believed he stood between Trump and chaos, he has told at least one person close to him that he may as well let the president do what he wants, even if it leads to impeachment – at least this chapter of American history would come to a close.

In recent months, his Secret Service detail has often been spotted standing outside the gym in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in the middle of the day – and White House officials who pass it on the way to meetings view his late morning workouts as an indication of him having thrown in the towel on trying to have any control inside the West Wing.