President Trump has said privately that he wants to appoint "a general" to replace White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, The New York Times reports.

The president, the Times reported on Thursday, has so far focused on Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly as a potential replacement, though advisers believe that would be a bad move.

Trump has reportedly said that he no longer has faith in Priebus, a former Republican National Committee chairman who was tapped for chief of staff shortly after Trump was elected.

Priebus has lost key allies in the White House over the past week, most notably former press secretary Sean Spicer, who resigned immediately after Trump appointed Anthony Scaramucci as his new communications director.

Scaramucci has carried out a public feud with Priebus since entering the White House. That feud accelerated on Thursday, when The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza published an interview with Scaramucci in which the communications director delivered a profanity-laced tirade against Priebus and accused him of leaking information to the press.

That tirade, in which he called Priebus a "f---ing paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac," was Scaramucci's clearest indication yet that he is trying to get rid of the chief of staff.

According to the Times, Priebus has been the subject of criticism from Trump himself. The president has brought up repeatedly how Priebus suggested that Trump withdraw from the presidential race last October after the release of the "Access Hollywood" tape.