The leaking threat isn’t necessarily exaggerated. Cernovich appears to have sources within the White House and has broken stories that could only have come from people with direct knowledge of internal proceedings, though he has told me he uses burner phones and encrypted apps, and doesn’t always know his sources’ identities.

Cernovich said he hasn’t coordinated with the other elements of the anti-McMaster campaign. “I’ve known about the Bannon-McMaster beef for a while, and frankly I don’t care,” Cernovich said. “Bannon’s got Breitbart to be his attack dog, so I’m not gonna do anything for Bannon.” (McMaster had Bannon removed from the NSC principals’ committee earlier this year, and the two have sparred particularly over Afghanistan policy.)

Cernovich’s assault on McMaster seems to be getting attention inside the White House. Even before this week’s drama, the national-security adviser was aware of Cernovich and concerned about his access to information from the inside, sources said. As previously reported by Bloomberg, McMaster referenced Cernovich in an all-hands meeting in July, and batted down talk of the Obama “holdovers” who’ve become a point of contention both inside the White House and in the conservative media.

According to two sources with direct knowledge of the meeting, McMaster also mentioned Cernovich at an NSC senior-directors meeting that day, which roughly 20 people attended. “He did bring it up and said, ‘This guy’s been targeting our people, he is posting personal information that has to have come from the inside,’” the source close to McMaster said. McMaster “really gets upset when he thinks people under his command, under his chain of command, are being unfairly attacked.”

Though the spate of departures from the NSC has looked like a purge of Flynn or Bannon allies given the timing, recent firings were motivated by different reasons. Higgins was fired for the memo he wrote, which he sent around using his government email account, a source familiar with the matter said. That was deemed an inappropriate use of government resources and contributed to him losing his job. (A source close to Higgins said he had only sent it from his personal computer to the office to print it.) As for Harvey, there were concerns about his management. Harvey was one of the biggest Iran hawks on the council and had had disagreements with McMaster. As for Cohen-Watnick, McMaster had tried to fire him months before.

Other recent moves within the NSC staff are apparently unrelated. Flynn appointee Victoria Coates, for example, voluntarily shifted to Jason Greenblatt’s Middle East team.

But rumors of a list of Flynn appointees who are supposedly next to be fired have been circulating for days. The Free Beacon reported this week that such a list exists, but there is disagreement among my sources as to whether that’s the case. McMaster contacted the people rumored to be on it and assured them their jobs are safe, according to the source close to McMaster.