The New York Times reported that Roger Ailes, former chairman and CEO of Fox News, has assumed an advisory role in the Trump campaign, successfully urging Trump to change his campaign’s leadership, and offered guidance on Trump’s television campaign ads.



While the Trump campaign previously denied Ailes’ advisory role, the Times reports that Trump convened a group “of paid and unpaid advisers including the pollster Kellyanne Conway, Roger Ailes, the ousted Fox News Chairman, and Stephen K. Bannon, the chairman of Breitbart news.” The report noted that during the meeting, Ailes “urged Mr. Trump to reconfigure the campaign’s leadership.” The next Tuesday, Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort was replaced by Stephen Bannon and Kellyanne Conway:

It was an article in The New York Times last weekend — about frequent but frustrated efforts by Mr. Trump’s top advisers to curtail his pugilistic instincts — that set off the series of events leading to Mr. Manafort’s departure. On Saturday, Mr. Trump raged at Mr. Manafort, holding him responsible for the article.



On Sunday, Mr. Trump hastily convened a meeting of paid and unpaid advisers including the pollster Kellyanne Conway; Roger Ailes, the ousted Fox News chairman; and Stephen K. Bannon, the chairman of Breitbart News, a conservative website. Mr. Manafort was not present.



Mr. Ailes urged Mr. Trump to reconfigure the campaign’s leadership, according to a Republican briefed on the meeting. A former Republican strategist and ad man who was friends with Mr. Trump long before his ouster, Mr. Ailes had reviewed some of the initial television commercials Mr. Manafort had overseen and told Mr. Trump in blunt terms that they were lackluster.



Only on Tuesday, the eve of its announcement, was Mr. Manafort informed of the campaign’s impending shake-up: Ms. Conway would become campaign manager, and Mr. Bannon would become the campaign’s chief executive.