In the months leading up to the disastrous 2006 election, President George W Bush fired his press secretary, Scott McClellan, and withdrew the Supreme Court nomination of his close confidante, Harriet Miers.

He waited until after the midterms, in which the Republicans lost control of the United States Congress, to fire Donald Rumsfeld as his secretary of defence, who had led the increasingly unpopular war against Iraq.

History repeats itself imperfectly.

Last week, President Donald Trump abruptly pulled the plug on Katie Zacharia after she had served just five short days as the White House spokesperson. Aside from her own dismissal, the biggest news Zacharia delivered was Kimberly Guilfoyle’s ouster from her position as the ambassador to Greece.

It is rumoured that Secretary of War Pete Hegseth is now on the chopping block, especially after the president rejected his plans to livestream the execution of Nidal Hasan, a terrorist who shot 13 people at Fort Hood military base in 2009.

Obviously, there are differences between the two presidencies.

McClellan had been the press secretary for........

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