Given Donald Trump’s penchant for, say, threatening a combative North Korea with “fire and fury,” or reportedly demanding a tenfold increase in the U.S. nuclear stockpile based on a single chart, it can be oddly reassuring to hear that, behind his back, his advisers express skepticism over his presidential know-how. Learning that Rex Tillerson privately called Trump a “moron,” for instance, buoyed the hope that the administration had not yet given up on diplomatic talks with Kim Jong-un. And when my colleague Gabriel Sherman reported musings of a plan by Cabinet members to talk down (or tackle) the president should he order a nuclear strike, it offered, if not relief then at least a semblance of solidarity. The same can be said of a new report from BuzzFeed News that National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster also mocked Trump’s intelligence behind his back. But in the general’s case, the story is equal parts reassurance that McMaster is independent of the whims of the Trump administration and signal that he could be next on the president’s well-used chopping block.

McMaster’s alleged comments came during a July dinner with Oracle C.E.O. Safra Catz, who served on Trump’s transition team and whose name has been floated for several high-profile administration jobs. The dinner meeting first appeared on the national radar when Axios reported that Catz, an Israeli-born executive alarmed by what she perceived as McMaster’s antagonistic views on Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories had relayed her fears to the staunchly pro-Israel G.O.P. megadonor Sheldon Adelson. (The White House quickly attempted to shut down the story, calling McMaster “remarkably pro-Israel.”) At the time, Catz reported to Adelson that the meeting “certainly enlightened [her] quite a bit” regarding McMaster’s geopolitical stance. But several sources told BuzzFeed’s Joe Bernstein that McMaster went far beyond contradicting the administration’s position on Israel and into the realm of knocking his colleagues.

McMaster bluntly trashed his boss, said the sources, four of whom told BuzzFeed News they heard about the exchange directly from Catz. The top national security official dismissed the president variously as an “idiot” and a “dope” with the intelligence of a “kindergartner,” the sources said.

A sixth source who was not familiar with the details of the dinner told BuzzFeed News that McMaster had made similarly derogatory comments about Trump’s intelligence to him in private, including that the president lacked the necessary brainpower to understand the matters before the National Security Council.

Over the course of the dinner, McMaster reportedly bashed, in no particular order, Defense Secretary James Mattis; State Secretary Rex Tillerson; former White House political strategist Steve Bannon; and Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner—of Kushner, BuzzFeed reports, “McMaster said he had no business being in the White House and should not be involved in national security issues.” Catz, who reportedly relayed the conversation to several sources, “said the conversation was so inappropriate that it was jaw-dropping,” one person told BuzzFeed. (Both Oracle and the White House dispute this version of McMaster’s comments; “none of the statements attributed to General McMaster were said,” Oracle’s senior V.P. of government affairs told BuzzFeed.)

McMaster’s remarks during the dinner, wherein he also reportedly praised the Iranian nuclear deal, were part of the reason Adelson privately bankrolled a campaign to oust him—a charge an Adelson spokesperson denied. Despite the effort, McMaster remained in place, though if Trump takes as much offense to “idiot” and “dope” as he does to “moron,” his job security might be up for debate.