“I think the president has put her in a very precarious position,” a senior Trump administration official said in a recent interview.

Hicks is not alone. Current and former Trump aides describe a president who often fails to observe boundaries about the Russia probe and who calls staffers into his office and raises the subject without warning.

Hicks in particular, Trump told her, could be “on both sides of the [bright] line.” As one of his longest-serving and most trusted aides, Hicks may have been subjected to an unwelcome amount of legally relevant comments from the president.

Speaking freely about an ongoing investigation is a major mistake, say veteran defense attorneys with White House experience.