FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe stepping down

FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe stepped down Monday as the agency’s No. 2, multiple sources familiar with the matter told NBC News.

McCabe will remain on the FBI payroll until he is eligible to retire with full benefits in mid-March, the sources said.

One source familiar said McCabe was exercising his retirement eligibility and characterized McCabe’s decision as "stepping aside."

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McCabe has been at the center of ongoing tensions between the White House and the FBI and has reportedly been under pressure to quit from President Donald Trump, whose campaign is being investigated for possible collusion with Russia.

Earlier this month, the Washington Post reported that after Trump had fired FBI Director James Comey, he met with McCabe in the Oval Office and asked him who he voted for in the 2016 election.

Trump, the officials told The Post, also vented his anger at McCabe over the several hundred thousand dollars in donations that his wife, a Democrat, received for her failed 2015 Virginia state Senate bid from a political action committee controlled by a close friend of Hillary Clinton.

A long career servant, McCabe had served at the FBI his entire career, since 1996, under former directors Robert Mueller and Comey.

Trump was asked on Monday whether he knew McCabe was stepping aside and he did not answer.