President Donald Trump appears to be coming to grips with the heightened scrutiny he could face after November if Democrats capture the House and possibly the Senate in the midterm elections, according to CNN, which cited a former member of Trump's media operation.

On Wednesday, Trump moved to distance himself from two of his top political advisers, writing that if their outside work [with Russia] presents a conflict, "I will terminate them, immediately!"

The statement came after a report by The New York Times showed that James Blair, who now leads Trump's outside political operation, and Chris LaCivita, Trump's 2024 co-campaign manager, traveled to the Balkans last week for paid work on behalf of a pro-Putin government enclave.

Sources who spoke with CNN said Trump claimed he was unaware that the two men had made the trip, or that they were representing a pro-Putin facet of the government, until the Times report was published.

Alyssa Farah Griffin, who served as White House director of strategic communications during Trump's first term told CNN anchor Anderson Cooper that the optics of the episode remained terrible.

"To frame either of these individuals is not senior … is laughable," Griffin said. "These are very senior officials. LaCivita was important to his campaign. …[and] right now, 27 days from the midterms, his top political advisors are somewhere abroad and not working on maintaining the House."

Griffin also drew attention to Trump's remarks suggesting he could have done "very bad things" to Hillary Clinton and other political rivals.

"I could have done very, very bad things to Joe Biden," Trump said after being asked what Democrats would impeach him for if the party wins back the House and the Senate in November. "I could have done very bad things to Barack Hussein Obama. I thought it was inappropriate to do so because you have to treat the office of the presidency with respect."

Critics noted that Trump has not always shown such restraint toward his purported enemies. He was impeached twice during his first term: once in response to a call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in which he pressured Ukraine to investigate Biden, and again following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. In both cases, Republican allies in the Senate declined to convict him. Under the Constitution, impeachment begins in the House, meaning a Democratic majority elected on November 3 would hold the power to launch investigations and bring articles of impeachment — the mechanism behind the oversight Griffin described.

"Not helpful musings as your closing message heading into the midterms," Griffin told Cooper. "It been a preoccupation of the president's that he likes to remind people he didn't go after Hillary Clinton, but he could have. This is a common refrain that he goes back to. But this honestly feels like a bob in a weave as he's starting to process the fact that he's had total control of the White House and both chambers of commerce of Congress. And that's about to change."

"He is going to be subject to oversight," Griffin continued, speaking of incoming Democrats. "He remembers Impeachment 1. He remembers Impeachment 2, and I don't think he wants to deal with what comes with a potential Impeachment 3."

This article was originally published by Alternet.