I don't know if this Times story is true or not, but if it is, it would indeed be shocking.
On the other hand, the way the Times presents this story, it's full of editorializing, unnamed sources and obvious bias against Trump. If it had been an editorial, I would have said ok, that's their opinion, but to present it as factual news at this point is a disgrace to the profession. (Not that the Times is a stranger to such disgraces. In the pre-WW2 Stalin era, the Times had a Moscow bureau chief, Walter Duranty, that wrote one glowing "news" report after another, explaining how wonderful the Soviet Union was, no famines, no mass purges, etc. Many years later, the Times admitted the Duranty stories were bogus, but never sent back the Pulitzer prize Duranty had received for those stories.)
I saw a similar round-table discussion on CNN last night, moderated by Anderson Cooper. Practically NOTHING but hearsay, with the obvious purpose of undermining Trump.