Trump administration National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and other staffers are out at the National Security Council, sources confirmed to Fox News.
Fox News confirmed Waltz and his deputy, Alex Wong, were ousted Thursday. Sources said additional staffers removed from the office will likely be announced, and President Donald Trump is expected to speak publicly about the matter.
Waltz, who previously served as a Florida congressman and as a decorated combat Green Beret, has come under fire from Democrats and critics since March, when the Atlantic magazine’s Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg published a firsthand account of getting added to a Signal group chat with top national security leaders, including Waltz, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, while they discussed strikes against Yemen terrorists.
Waltz took responsibility for the inclusion of a journalist in the group chat, telling Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, ‘I take full responsibility. I built the group,’ he said. ‘It’s embarrassing. We’re going to get to the bottom of it.’
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News Digital earlier Monday when asked about reports claiming Waltz and others would be shown the door, ‘We are not going to respond to reporting from anonymous sources.’
Trump held a meeting with members of his cabinet on Wednesday following his 100th day back in office Tuesday, with Waltz attending the meeting.
Following confirmation of Waltz’s ouster, 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 served as Waltz’s principal deputy national security advisor, who was detailed in the Signal chat leak as the staffer charged with ‘pulling together a tiger team’ in Waltz’s initial message sent to the Signal group chat in March, the Atlantic reported at the time.
‘Team – establishing a principles [sic] group for coordination on Houthis, particularly for over the next 72 hours,’ Waltz wrote in the group chat. ‘My deputy Alex Wong is pulling together a tiger team at deputies/agency Chief of Staff level following up from the meeting in the Sit Room this morning for action items and will be sending that out later this evening.’
Trump told the media April 3 that a handful of other National Security Council staffers had been let go following the Atlantic’s report on the Signal chat leak, which characterized the Trump administration as texting ‘war plans’ regarding a planned strike on Houthi rebels in Yemen.
‘Always, 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,’ Trump said from Air Force One on April 3 when asked about reports on the National Security Council firings.
Trump confirmed at the time that National Security Council members had been fired, but remarked it was not many individuals. He added that he continued to trust his National Security Council team, remarking that they’ve ‘done very well’ and ‘had big success with the Houthis.’
The Trump administration maintained, however, that no classified material was transmitted in the Signal chat in March, with Trump repeatedly defending Waltz amid the fallout. The strikes on Houthi rebels unfolded on March 15.
Leavitt told the media in March that the White House considered the Signal group chat leak case ‘closed’ while continuing to offer support to Waltz, whose office allegedly mistakenly added the journalist to the chat.
‘As the president has made it very clear, Mike Waltz continues to be an important part of his national security team,’ Leavitt told the media in brief remarks during a gaggle outside the White House’s press room March 31. ‘And this case has been closed here at the White House, as far as we are concerned.’
‘There have been steps made to ensure that something like that can obviously never happen again,’ she continued. ‘And we’re moving forward. And the president and Mike Waltz and his entire national security team have been working together very well, if you look at how much safer the United States of America is because of the leadership of this team.’