Anthony Scaramucci denies asking FBI to investigate Donald Trump’s chief of staff Reince Priebus

Donald Trump's new communications director has denied publicly asking the FBI to investigate his chief of staff on Twitter.

Anthony Scaramucci deleted a tweet that was interpreted as calling for the FBI to investigate Reince Priebus for leaking.

Mr Scaramucci had tweeted: "In light of the leak of my financial disclosure info which is a felony. I will be contacting @FBI and the @TheJusticeDept #swamp @Reince45"

The tweet tagged Mr Priebus's Twitter account.

"In case there's any ambiguity in his tweet I can confirm that Scaramucci wants the FBI to investigate Reince for leaking," New York Times reporter Ryan Lizza wrote on Twitter.

After Mr Scaramucci deleted his tweet, he responded to an Axios article about the story to say: "Wrong! Tweet was public notice to leakers that all Sr Adm officials are helping to end illegal leaks. @Reince45"

His initial tweet appeared to be a reference to a Politico report revealing he will still be able to profit from his stake in his investment firm after he became communications director.

Between 1 January and the end of June, Mr Scaramucci earned earned $4.9m (£3.7m) from his stake in SkyBridge as well as more than $5m (£3.8m) in salary.

He is still listed as the managing director on the firm's website, even though he has been a government employee for more than a month.

On Wednesday, Mr Scaramucci, told Fox News he expected Mr Trump would soon announce a plan to stem leaks, adding that there seemed to be some "political holdovers from the Obama administration that are not helping."

He said he recognized it was "impossible" to eliminate leaks in Washington but added: "We'™re going to try and hit a cultural reset on these leaks not only here in the White House, but I'm going to be working with the agencies and the departments to do that.

"œNow one of the big problems here that I'm discovering in the [communications] team is that senior people are really the guys doing the leaking and they ask junior people to leak for them," Mr Scaramucci told Fox News in a separate interview later on the same day.

On Tuesday, he told reporters on Air Force One after Mr Trump's trip to Ohio he would probably restructure the communications operation at the White House and fire staff if leaks did not cease: "If the leaks continue, then I've got to let everybody go."

Additional reporting by Reuters