The White House has confirmed that President Trump kept his National Security Adviser in place for nearly three weeks after he first learned that Michael Flynn might be a national security risk.
The resignation was announced late Monday after Lieutenant General Flynn was accused of lying to Vice President Mike Pence and others about the nature of his conversations with Russia's ambassador to the USA.
President Trump says the "real story" behind Michael Flynn's departure are the leaks that seem to permeate his White House.
But as Simon Marks reports from Washington, there are now demands even from some Republicans for a probe of President Trump's connections with Moscow.
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It is very early in the life of this Presidency….any Presidency for that matter….for some classic Washington questions to be asked.
Like: Did he go, or was he fired?
After several hours of prevarication, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters that National Security Adviser Michael Flynn's resignation was demanded by the President.
Not that he'd done anything illegal, reporters were to understand….merely that the President's trust in his top foreign policy aide had "eroded".
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Which has only led reporters to ask another one of those classic Washington questions: what did the President know and when did he know it?
The White House says President Trump was alerted to the fact that Michael Flynn lied about the content of his phone calls with the Russian ambassador as early as January the 26th.
And yet this is what Donald Trump had to say on the matter only last Friday, February the 10th.
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That was on board Air Force 1 as he flew to his Mar A Lago estate for a golf outing with the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
But if the President really knew his National Security Adviser was a national security threat more than two weeks ago….why was he allowed to continue sitting in classified meetings?
That question led to a testy televised exchange between top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway and Matt Lauer of NBC.
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That non-answer added to the sense of a White House in crisis.
Democrats were soon piling on.
Their leader in the House of Representatives…Nancy Pelosi.
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But an even bigger problem for the President is frayed support among Republicans.
Senator Roy Blunt less than a month ago presided over the President's inauguration….now the Missouri Republican wants an investigation into the President's connections to Russia.
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Less than a month into the Trump Presidency, Washington is salivating over the scent of scandal in the air.
A White House now on the defensive….intelligence agencies so concerned its highest levels are compromised they are reportedly nervous about providing classified information for fear it will end up in the hands of the Kremlin.
President Trump has expressed frustration that his White House is leaking to reporters like a sieve.
"Will these leaks be happening as I deal on North Korea?" he asked rhetorically on Twitter.
The answer is yes: and it's almost certain there will be more leaks about the President, the Russians and his now former National Security Adviser in the days ahead.
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