In the 16th century, mice and rats were credited with knowing when a rotten house was on the verge of collapse.
This evolved into the idiom about fleeing a sinking ship, but the original version suggested more prescience, an ability to anticipate oblivion and get out ahead of time.
The question hovering over the officials quitting the White House is whether they have left it too late, whether they will carry the Donald Trump stain no matter how fast they run.
The education secretary, Betsy DeVos, the transport secretary, Elaine Chao, and the deputy national security adviser, Matt Pottinger, are among at least a dozen officials and aides who have resigned since a mob of the president’s supporters stormed the US Capitol on Wednesday, leading to five deaths, including that of a police officer.
Other former loyalists without a formal position in the administration have joined the scramble for cover by publicly renouncing Trump.
“There is no mistaking the impact your rhetoric had on the situation, and it is the inflection point for me,” DeVos said in her letter quitting the cabinet. The mayhem in the Capitol was “unconscionable for our country”, she said.
The president’s attempt on Thursday to distance himself from the mob by saying those who “broke the law will pay” and pledging an “orderly transition” to Joe Biden on 20 January was viewed in part as an attempt to stem more White House defections.
“It shows there’s a backing away from Trump within his administration,” said Geoffrey Kabaservice, the author of Rule and Ruin: the Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party. “It’s partly about people looking at their political legacies and reputations and believing that Trump is damaged goods at this point.”
The shocking disorder in Washington DC would taint Trump and his children and greatly diminish their sway over the Republican party, said Kabaservice. As a Trump critic he welcomed the officials’ resignations. “I guess late conversion is better than no conversion at all.”
Chao, who is married to the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, said in her resignation letter the violence “deeply troubled me in a way that I simply cannot set aside”.
Mick Mulvaney, a former White House chief of staff, said Trump’s incitement of the mob compelled him to quit as special envoy to Northern Ireland. He predicted more resignations but said not all disillusioned staff would leave. “Those who choose to stay, and I have talked with some of them, are choosing to stay because they’re worried the president might put someone worse in,” Mulvaney told CNBC.
Others to leave include Tyler Goodspeed, the acting chairman of the White House council of economic advisers, Stephanie Grisham, the first lady’s chief of staff, Sarah Matthews, the deputy White House press secretary, and Ryan Tully, a senior adviser on Russia.
The fate of those fleeing an administration in its twilight is unclear.
For Republicans who disdained Trump’s incendiary rhetoric on race, immigration and other issues it feels rather late. “You have to wonder why it took them so long to see what Trump is,” said John Pitney, a Claremont McKenna College political scientist and former Republican congressional aide.
“Did they not understand his character? Did they not know of the many times he winked at violence? The resignations would have had much more force if they had come months or years ago,” said Pitney, author of Un-American: the Fake Patriotism of Donald Trump.
Recently minted ex-Trumpers will occupy an awkward position in a GOP that is splitting between those who had warned of Trump’s damage to the country and party and those who still align with the president’s policies and supporters.
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“Trump is more toxic than before. But he still has the support of a shockingly large fraction of Republican voters,” said Pitney. “As long as he wants to be politically active, he will be a force in the party. I don’t think he’s going away, for one simple reason: politics is his main source of income. He can continue to line his pockets by selling merchandise and otherwise monetising his status. He will need the money for the colossal legal fees he will face in the years ahead.”
Some former officials, even those who left the administration before Wednesday’s mayhem, say they have struggled to find work because of association with the president.
“People who are hiring see everything that’s happened and have to question your morals and ethics – especially in terms of what continues to happen today – on why you chose to work for that environment,” Olivia Troye, a former homeland security and White House official who left in August, told Politico.
A defence official who is seeking another job told the news site that one potential employer had compared Trump administration staff to the Hitler Youth. “That attitude is not helpful,” the official said.
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