Representative Mike Waltz, President Trump’s pick to lead the National Security Council, said in an iinterview released Thursday that all current NSC officials assigned by another agency are expected to leave the building once Trump is sworn in.
“Everyone will resign on January 20th at 12:01 p.m.,” Waltz said. “We are currently working on our process to get everyone their approvals and are going through the transition process. Our people know who we want in the agencies, we make those requests, and as far as the details go, they will all come back.”
What Waltz, a retired Special Forces colonel, is responding to is the obstructions and leaks by NSC staff borrowed from other agencies that damaged Trump’s agenda in his first term. He plans to get rid of people who may have made careers through the “interagency process” and have more loyalty to that process than Trump. These people are replaced by other people who are also assigned from agencies but have been vetted and hand-picked by Waltz and his deputies.
Needless to say, not everyone is joyful, not least a retired Army lieutenant colonel named Alexander Vindman.
Statement on layoffs of National Security Service employees
Yesterday: Mike Waltz, President Trump’s national security adviser @michaelgwaltz announced a sweeping directive to lay off all national security personnel on loan from other departments and agencies and serving in non-political,…
— Alexander S. Vindman 🇺🇸 (@AVindman) January 10, 2025
Yesterday: Mike Waltz, President Trump’s national security adviser @michaelgwaltzannounced a sweeping directive to fire all national security employees on loan from other departments and agencies who hold non-political, non-partisan leadership positions. Waltz described this decision as a means to eliminate Biden-era candidates and impose absolute conformity with Trump’s political agenda. Waltz specifically justified this move by citing my role in exposing Trump’s abuse of power, which led to his first impeachment. Using my actions as justification, Waltz wants to fire numerous professionals from the Defense Department, the State Department, the CIA and other agencies – not because of their behavior, but because of the demand for blind loyalty to Trump. This approach sends a clear and troubling message: In a second Trump administration, only political loyalists will be allowed to serve on the NSC.
To be clear, I served as a non-political official and devoted Army officer in implementing President Trump’s national security agenda as outlined in the National Security Strategy he approved. My actions did not conflict with Trump’s stated national security policy. My reporting on corruption – my refusal to remain noiseless as Trump engaged in criminal activity and undermined free and fair elections by pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rival Joe Biden in an attempt to steal the 2020 election – and mine Refusal to break my oath to the U.S. Constitution is the reason I was fired. These are the same reasons why professional staff will soon be fired and non-political staff will be expelled from the NSC.
No, you were fired because you leaked a confidential conversation to a co-conspirator who then called himself a “whistleblower” to create a fake-fact case for President Trump’s impeachment. And also because he was a treacherous oxygen thief.
On the surface, it makes sense for a president to seek a devoted and trustworthy team that will stay true to his plans. However, absolute loyalty should not be the exclusive qualification, overarching competence, experience and fidelity to a constitutional oath. An NSC with “team members who are 100% aligned with the President’s agenda” will not only reduce the NSC’s capabilities but also undermine policy continuity. Worse, it creates an environment in which dissenting views, even those based on experience and ethical responsibility, are suppressed.
There is a recognized danger in groupthink. We can see this in the way the Biden NSC has coddled Iran, China and Russia in the misguided view that in some bizarre universe they would become useful members of the international community. Disagreements do not have to be resolved at the staff level. Additionally, I don’t think anyone in the Trump administration is interested in “continuity of policy” with Biden, as his foreign policy failures, both busy and in terms of missed opportunities, are legendary.
The so-called “Vindman Rule” sets a perilous precedent by ensuring that only political loyalists can serve on the NSC, advise the president, and interact with the president and top decision-makers. Such an approach will have a chilling effect on senior policy staff across government. Talented professionals who are wary of being fired because of their principled stance or objective advice tend to self-censor or quit service altogether. This undermines the NSC’s very purpose: to provide the President and the coordination team with the best possible advice to advance U.S. national security interests.
One has to admire how Vindman classifies himself as a “talented professional” who was fired because he ““To take fundamental positions or give objective advice.” In fact, the role of policy-making in the public service is the responsibility of political appointees. Career employees are expected to serve each president loyally. The last thing needed in the NSC are employees who are first and foremost loyal to “the way we’ve always done it” who worry too much about the agency’s “stock” about which it is when making decisions and who see themselves as independent political actors.
The effects of this loyalty over competence model are devastating. By purging the NSC of apolitical, experienced professionals, Trump and Waltz are weakening the institutional expertise needed to address convoluted global challenges. This creates a political apparatus incapable of distinguishing sound policy from reckless impulses—or worse, one that actively disregards legal and ethical obligations to carry out Trump’s personal whims. Consider the implications: Would Defense Department officials still advise against invading Greenland or Canada, or encourage these foolhardy thoughts to gain favor? Would FBI employees agree to take political retaliation against Trump’s enemies to serve on the NSC? These are not far-fetched concerns, but real dangers associated with the precedent set by Waltz.
Of course, this is a straw man constructed by someone with terminal TDS. More specifically, who really cares what defense or FBI employees would advise? What evidence do we have from the last four years provided by the NSC? the institutional expertise required to address convoluted global challenges? If Vindman is concerned about “reckless impulses,” he should look at Biden lifting sanctions on Iran and handing out billions of dollars in cash, or the decision to allow the Houthis to close a key maritime chokepoint, or the deal with the complete fiasco that has taken place during our withdrawal from Afghanistan.
This announcement also hints at broader plans by the Trump administration to fire tens of thousands of senior non-political government officials and replace them with Trump loyalists. By prioritizing loyalty above all else, the Trump administration will significantly undermine the foundations of good governance, endanger U.S. national security, and weaken U.S. democracy.
There is no evidence that Trump plans to fire “t.”“There is ample evidence that the Democratic apparatchiks who are part of the “resistance” and have entrenched themselves in public service to obstruct a Republican president’s agenda are headed for disaster. Hobbes’ “lonely, destitute, evil, “brutal and short” existence.
