Talk:Counselor to the President

Position Abolished?
Would it be accurate to state that this position has been abolished under the Obama Administration? --TommyBoy (talk) 09:38, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
 * As far as I can tell the position of Counselor to the President was a position akin to Director of White House Communications created by President Bush, it no longer exists. Benny45boy (talk) 20:49, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I have updated the article to reflect this discussion. --TommyBoy (talk) 21:26, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090122234325/http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/staff/david_axelrod/ to http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/staff/david_axelrod/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090422150803/http://change.gov:80/newsroom/entry/president_elect_obama_and_vice_presiden_elect_biden_announce_key_white_hous/ to http://change.gov/newsroom/entry/president_elect_obama_and_vice_presiden_elect_biden_announce_key_white_hous/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090122234327/http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/staff/pete_rouse/ to http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/staff/pete_rouse/
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Powell
I'm fairly sure that, while Dina Powell is a fairly important adviser, she's not a "Counselor to the President." However, I'm having trouble finding a source that clearly describes Trump's top advisers. Orser67 (talk) 15:44, 30 January 2017 (UTC)
 * According to this source she is "assistant to the president" and "senior counselor". Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 17:14, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

Is Bannon actually a Counselor?
This article lists Steve Bannon as a Senior Counselor, based on the fact that his appointment as Senior Counselor was announced shortly after the election. This title doesn't appear to be in active use, though.

The memo announcing his appointment to the NSC lists his title as "The Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist" -- the title "Counselor" doesn't appear anywhere.

If you search the White House website for "counselor bannon", there are no hits, whereas if you search for "strategist bannon" or "counselor kellyanne conway" there are.

It seems like the intent was to name him Senior Counselor, but they decided to name him Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist instead. Given that, I think references to Bannon should be removed from this article. Thoughts? Stephen Hui (talk) 19:46, 1 February 2017 (UTC)


 * Please see Talk:Steve Bannon. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:01, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

None of the three Trump appointees can be considered Counselor to the President
Counselor to the President is a rank as well as a title, it is a rank above Assistant to the President, which is above Deputy Assistant and Special Assistant. As noted elsewhere, Bannon is an Assistant to the President, as is Kellyanne Conway. Dina Powell is a Deputy Assistant to the President. Therefore none of them are currently Counselor to the President. They don't meet the requirements for this article simply by having the word "Counselor" in their job title. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.132.212.103 (talk) 20:07, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Do you have any evidence for this? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:22, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Check any of the annual White House salary reports and the hierarchy is apparent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.132.212.103 (talk) 23:29, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
 * This is now confirmed as of the annual report released today. Both of Trump's "counselors" are actually "Assistant to the President" rank.  Neither of them belong on this article.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.132.212.103 (talk) 04:33, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

Disputed
This isn't a new topic, but rather a continuation of the previous two. Regardless, I'm starting a new topic as stipulated in Template:Disputed.

Would anyone object to me tagging this article as WP:DISPUTED because of the confusion over who has what title in the Trump administration? Conway is the only Trump advisor of the three listed in this article who is referred to as Counselor to the President on whitehouse.gov. The only reference to Bannon's title there lists his title (without naming him directly) as "The Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist", while there's no mention of Powell's role in the administration at all.

I thought about tagging the article as WP:EXHELP, but that seems inappropriate. Given the absence of published information on the Trump administration's organizational structure, probably the only experts who could speak definitively on the subject would be members of said administration, and it seems unlikely that they'd be editing Wikipedia.

Left to my own devices I'd just delete Bannon and Powell from the article for the reasons listed above, but I'm trying to be respectful of consensus given the lack of sources.

If no one replies within a few days, I'll go ahead and tag the article. Stephen Hui (talk) 04:37, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I accept that it is disputed but I am not sure if it best to remove them. We literally only have evidence to support that they are counsellors whereas it is the absence of evidence that suggests they are not counsellors. As mentioned in a discussion linked from of the previous two topics a salary report should come out with job titles and hopefully it could confirm everything. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 13:20, 10 February 2017 (UTC)


 * Yep, just to clarify -- it's my intention to tag the article as disputed but not remove anyone's name until more definitive evidence comes out. I do think there's value in tagging the article until then, though, to indicate that it's less trustworthy than usual. Stephen Hui (talk) 15:36, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

So since I've been the primary editor on this article, I'll weigh in. I noted the concerns and removed Dina Powell, who did not have the same access at the White House as previous counselors despite her title as "senior counselor" and Steve Bannon, who's official title was announced as "White House Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor" but has since repeatedly only used the White House Chief Strategist title since starting on January 20. Since I have done that and also edited Powell and Bannon's articles, I am going to remove the disputed tag as it relates to their roles. Please continue the discussion and edits if you feel it's necessary.

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