Trump loyalist Ric Grenell is sowing confusion on the world stage in his role as “envoy of special missions,” according to administration sources.

Grenell, the former U.S. ambassador to Germany and briefly the acting Director of National Intelligence in the last, chaotic days of the first Trump administration, is already serving as Donald Trump’s top cultural enforcer in his role as interim head of the Kennedy Center in Washington, and was tasked with overseeing the federal government’s response to the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this year.

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Those were door prizes after Grenell lobbied hard in the first days of the second administration for a high-profile post like Secretary of State or National Security Advisor and came up short. Both those jobs now belong to Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

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So Trump made Grenell “Special Presidential Envoy for Special Missions,” a position without a clearly defined set of responsibilities but the word “special” in the title twice. One source close to Trump World said that “Ric Grenell is a man in search of a job.”

Now, Grenell is earning contempt from Rubio and others in the administration who say his “freelancing” as special envoy is damaging U.S. diplomatic negotiations and threatening national security, The Hill reports.

The latest example is a deal to swap Americans held in Venezuela for purported Venezuelan members of the Tren de Aragua gang deported from the U.S. and held in El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison.

Earlier this year, State Department officials thought they had a deal that would result in the release of at least eight Americans held in captivity in Venezuela, along with several other political prisoners and other foreign nationals “kidnapped” by the Maduro regime and held as bargaining chips in negotiations with the U.S.

At the same time, Grenell was brokering his own deal with the Maduro regime, which held more favorable terms for the Venezuelan despot, including a resumption of oil sales with American oil giant Chevron. Rubio has long rejected that concession.

Rubio was unaware Grenell was negotiating with the same Venezuelan intermediary that the State Department was talking to, until both deals collapsed in May.

“I think that’s what happens when Grenell goes freelancing,” said Elliott Abrams, who served as special representative for Iran and Venezuela in Trump’s first term and believes there are “certainly” tensions between Grenell and Rubio, whose job the special envoy covets.

“So I think what needs to happen here is to leave foreign affairs in the hands of the State Department, and in this case, Rubio and [Deputy Secretary of State] Chris Landau, and just get Grenell’s butt out.”

Another source described Grenell as “a little untethered.”

“I would describe Ric as kind of a little bit of — maybe not even a little bit — a loose cannon. He’s involved in a million things. He’s running around. The president likes him and it’s a classic thing, like, the president likes him, these guys feel empowered. There’s no checks, no balances,” the source added.

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