 |
| Mike Waltz, Other NSC Staff Removed After Signal Chat Leak |
Mike Waltz, National Security Advisor under the Trump administration, has been removed from the National Security Council (NSC), along with his deputy Alex Wong and other staffers, Fox News confirmed.
The shakeup follows a leak involving a private Signal chat that included top national security officials. More removals from the NSC are expected soon, and former President Donald Trump is likely to address the matter publicly.
Waltz, a former Florida congressman and decorated Green Beret, faced criticism after The Atlantic’s Editor-in-Chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, reported being mistakenly added to a Signal group chat involving Waltz, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe. The group was discussing potential military strikes on terrorist targets in Yemen.
Waltz took full responsibility for the incident in an interview with Fox News' Laura Ingraham. "I take full responsibility. I built the group," he admitted. "It's embarrassing. We're going to get to the bottom of it."
When asked earlier this week about the reported removals, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said, "We are not going to respond to reporting from anonymous sources."
Waltz was still present during a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, which followed Trump’s 100th day back in office. However, confirmation of his removal came soon after.
Reacting to the news, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told Fox News, "The National Security Advisor Waltz is out. He’s the first. He certainly won’t be the last."
Wong, who was Waltz’s principal deputy, played a role in organizing a rapid response group. According to The Atlantic, Wong was tasked with assembling a "tiger team" to handle a potential crisis involving the Houthis in Yemen.
In the chat, Waltz wrote: "Team – establishing a principles [sic] group for coordination on Houthis, particularly for over the next 72 hours. My deputy Alex Wong is pulling together a tiger team... for action items and will be sending that out later this evening."
Trump acknowledged on April 3 that additional NSC staffers had been let go following the Signal leak. He told reporters from Air Force One, "We’re going to let go of people we don’t like, or people we don’t think can do the job, or people who may have loyalties to somebody else."
He confirmed the firings but said they involved only a few individuals. Trump expressed continued confidence in his security team, citing successes in dealing with the Houthis.
Despite the fallout, the administration insisted no classified information was shared in the Signal chat. Trump and his aides had initially defended Waltz.
On March 31, Press Secretary Leavitt said, "Mike Waltz continues to be an important part of [Trump's] national security team. And this case has been closed here at the White House, as far as we are concerned."
She added, "There have been steps made to ensure that something like that can obviously never happen again... the president and Mike Waltz and his entire national security team have been working together very well."
The White House had considered the matter resolved in March, continuing to stand by Waltz despite the embarrassing error of adding a journalist to a sensitive group chat.
