White House chief economic adviser Gary Cohn has spoken "many times" with President Donald Trump about his comments on the Charlottesville violence nearly two weeks ago, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Friday.
"The president and Gary have spoken many times," Sanders told reporters at the daily briefing. "Gary has not held back.
"He has not held back on how he feels about the situation," she added. "I don't think that anyone was surprised by the comments."
The New York Times reported Friday that Cohn, who is Jewish, drafted his resignation after Trump's volatile news conference last week with reporters at Trump Tower, where he doubled down on his initial remarks that "both sides" were responsible for the unrest that killed a local woman and injured 19 others.
The day before, Cohn told The Financial Times that he was "under enormous pressure" to both resign and stay on, though choosing to remain.
However, he told the financial publication that President Trump and the "administration can and must do better in consistently and unequivocally condemning" hate groups.
Cohn is so far one of the few in the Trump White House to publicly condemn the president's remarks about the rally organized by white nationalist groups over the removal of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's statue from a downtown Charlottesville park.
In addition, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who rejected calls from Yale University classmates and alumni to resign after Trump's comments, said Friday that "Gary is committed to being here."
"There's no question he was not equating the hate groups with people who were peaceful," Mnuchin, who also is Jewish, told reporters of the president's remarks. "Under no circumstances was I going to resign.
"Gary and I have known each other for 20 years. I am speaking to him every day.
"His number one focus is absolutely working on tax reform with me and getting tax reform done," he said.
"Gary is committed to be here — and I couldn't be more excited about that."