--- title: Donald Trump Spars With Former Top Aide Roger Stone Over Exit description: Donald Trump is parting ways with Roger Stone, one of his top political advisers, the pair announced separately Saturday canonical: https://time.com/3989865/donald-trump-roger-stone-exit/ author: Zeke Miller article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-08-08T19:57:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:47:10.212Z article:section: Politics og:title: Donald Trump Spars With Former Top Aide Over Exit og:description: "You're fired" vs. "I quit" og:url: https://time.com/3989865/donald-trump-roger-stone-exit/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf2ad4da93454b2ae/69885b733c16395d37458e50/gettyimages-480309148.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4200 og:image:height: 2363 og:image:alt: US-POLITICS-TRUMP og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Donald Trump Spars With Former Top Aide Over Exit twitter:description: "You're fired" vs. "I quit" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf2ad4da93454b2ae/69885b733c16395d37458e50/gettyimages-480309148.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Donald Trump Spars With Former Top Aide Over Exit > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Aug 8, 2015 7:57 PM UTC  Donald Trump gestures while speaking surrounded by people whose families were victims of illegal immigrants on July 10, 2015 while meeting with the press at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, California. (FREDERIC J. BROWN--AFP/Getty Images) Donald Trump gestures while speaking surrounded by people whose families were victims of illegal immigrants on July 10, 2015 while meeting with the press at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, California. (FREDERIC J. BROWN--AFP/Getty Images) FREDERIC J. BROWN—AFP/Getty Images by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Aug 8, 2015 7:57 PM UTC Donald Trump is parting ways with Roger Stone, one of his top political advisers, the pair announced separately Saturday, but the terms of split are far from clear. In an interview with the Washington _Post_, Trump said he fired Stone, a self-professed political hit-man and GOP operative dating back to Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign. Stone, for his part, said he resigned Friday over the Republican front-runner’s [criticism of Fox News host Megyn Kelly](http://time.com/3989656/donald-trump-redstate-gathering/). “Mr. Trump fired Roger Stone last night,” a Trump campaign spokesperson said, blaming the split on Stone’s self-promotion. “We have a tremendously successful campaign and Roger wanted to use the campaign for his own personal publicity. He has had a number of articles about him recently and Mr. Trump wants to keep the focus of the campaign on how to Make America Great Again.” Stone pushed back on the report in a [tweet](https://twitter.com/RogerJStoneJr/status/630090813813428225), and released what he said was his letter of resignation to Trump: > [](https://twitter.com/RogerJStoneJr/status/630090813813428225) “Unfortunately, the current controversies involving personalities and provocative media fights have reached such a high volume that it has distracted attention from your platform and overwhelmed your core message,” Stone wrote. “With this current direction of the candidacy, I no longer can remain involved in your campaign.” Stone is the second Trump operative to leave the campaign in recent weeks, following the exit of aide Sam Nunberg amid the revelation of controversial social media postings. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3989865/donald-trump-roger-stone-exit/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3989865/donald-trump-roger-stone-exit/"},"headline":"Donald Trump Spars With Former Top Aide Over Exit","datePublished":"2015-08-08T19:57:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:47:10.212Z","description":"\"You're fired\" vs. \"I quit\"","url":"https://time.com/3989865/donald-trump-roger-stone-exit/","keywords":["2016 Election","2016 Election","Donald Trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf2ad4da93454b2ae/69885b733c16395d37458e50/gettyimages-480309148.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Zeke Miller","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf2ad4da93454b2ae/69885b733c16395d37458e50/gettyimages-480309148.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"US-POLITICS-TRUMP","caption":"US-POLITICS-TRUMP","creditText":"FREDERIC J. 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