White House principal deputy press secretary Harrison Fields is leaving the administration to join the Republican-run lobbying firm CGCN Group, after just seven months in his previous role. Fields was often quoted as a White House spokesperson in major media outlets, accusing NPR and PBS of "creating media to support a particular political party on the taxpayers' dime" in a May article for Axios and justifying Trump's attacks on large law firms for having allegedly "propelled one-sided justice by providing pro bono resources to those causes that make our nation more dangerous and less free" in a recent Wall Street Journal report.

In addition to Fields' exit, Trent Morse — who is a deputy assistant to the president and the deputy director of the White House's Office of Presidential Personnel — is launching his own lobbying firm, while also teaming up with the powerhouse lobbying firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck. White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, who worked alongside Morse at two other lobbying firms over the last decade, heaped praise on Morse as he made his exit, calling him "an important and integral part of the successes we’ve had."

Ivan Adler, who runs an executive hiring firm in Washington, told Politico that the early exits of senior Trump staffers was proof that so many lobbying clients are "looking for a sherpa for this administration, just because it’s so different," and that "people are taking advantage" of their knowledge by hiring them directly from the White House.

Federal law requires a year-long "cooling off" period from the time a former government worker leaves their position to when they can begin officially lobbying the West Wing and representing foreign entities, meaning that for Fields and Morse, their cooling off window will be longer than their actual time serving in the White House. However, they can begin lobbying Congress immediately.