Good Friday morning. I'm Anna Palmer and welcome to your Politico Playbook Audio Briefing,

sponsored by the Better Medicare Alliance. And I'm Jake Sherman. New York Times, Mike Schmidt,

has a bombshell piece this morning looking at Trump's struggle to keep a grip on the Russian investigation.

In March, he told Don McGahn, the White House counsel, to stop Jeff Sessions from recusing himself from the Russia probe.

But McGahn was unsuccessful, frustrating Trump and Trump aides.

Trump asked, where is my Roy Cohn?

He was referring to his former personal lawyer and fixer who had been Joseph McCarthy's

top aide during investigations into communist activities in the 50s and 60s.

Here's what's on President Donald Trump's mind.

Trump was tweeting last night about the stock market hitting a new high.

He wrote, can you imagine if O was president and had these numbers would be biggest story

on earth, Dow now over 25,000.

He also addressed the Michael Wolf book, writing, I authorized zero access to White House,

actually turned him down many times for author of phony book. I never spoke to him for book,

full of lies, misrepresentations, and sources that don't exist. Look at this guy's past and watch

what happens to him him and sloppy Steve.

There are multiple Steve Bannon as fading pieces this morning. He has lost his biggest financial

backer, Rebecca Mercer, further isolating Bannon and potentially crippling his ambitions for the

2018 midterms. The Washington Post reports that even his position as chairman of Breitbart is being

reviewed by

the company's leadership. Andrew Rastushushia and Matt Nussbaum write that Trump is still fuming over the

Michael Wolf book as former aides like Katie Walsh are under fire from some in the administration for her

...