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Donald Trump has dramatically shrunk the White House’s National Security Council by firing some officials, placing others on administrative leave and ordering many secondees to return to their home agencies.
Several people familiar with the firings said the NSC, which is being run temporarily by secretary of state Marco Rubio, had retained some staff, mostly senior directors, while eliminating dozens of positions in the office.
The move, which one person described as a “liquidation”, comes three weeks after Trump fired Mike Waltz as his first national security adviser, the top position at the NSC.
The officials who lost their positions were notified on Friday afternoon about the move, which followed weeks of speculation about an imminent purge of the security officials.
Three people familiar with the dismissals said Ivan Kanapathy, the senior director for Asia, remained but his China team had been let go.
Robert O’Brien, who served as national security adviser in the first Trump administration, recently wrote an OpEd calling for the NSC to be cut to 60 officials. The NSC, which traditionally has served as a coordinating office but has sometimes been used to centralise power in the White House, had over 200 officials during the Biden administration.
Some supporters said the move would help Trump by reducing the number of officials from other agencies who might not support his “Make America Great Again” agenda. But others questioned how it might affect broader US policy.
“While it might seem a hobbling bureaucratic move because the NSC’s purpose is to staff the president, its significance is about far more,” said one former NSC official.
“By whittling down the NSC staff to almost nothing, you kneecap the US government’s ability to generate foreign policy options, or to potentially act as a break on Trump’s preferences. All that remains is presidential power.”
The NSC could not immediately be reached for comment.
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