Mike Waltz Out As National Security Advisor

Hold onto your seats, America, because a big shake-up is going down in Washington.

In a move that is sending shockwaves through the corridors of power, President Donald Trump, as reported by multiple national news outlets, is planning to dismiss National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. Waltz, a decorated Green Beret and former congressman, was appointed to the role in January 2025. His tenure, however, was marred by a significant security breach involving the encrypted messaging app Signal.

The controversy erupted when Waltz inadvertently added Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, to a Signal group chat where senior officials discussed sensitive military operations, including planned strikes in Yemen. The inclusion of a journalist in such a high-level discussion raised immediate concerns about the administration’s handling of classified information. ​

A Comedy of Errors: The Signal Chat Debacle and More

Mike Waltz didn’t just screw up once. No, this wasn’t a single “oops” moment with Signal and a wrong journalist invite. What we’re looking at is a full-blown digital frat house masquerading as the National Security Council. Waltz apparently ran the whole damn show from Signal—twenty group chats discussing everything from Ukraine ceasefires to China strategy to Middle East strikes.

One source nailed it: “Waltz built the entire NSC communications process on Signal.” That includes Trump’s transition team period, where he was already laying the foundation for a shadow IT operation fueled by end-to-end encryption and total disregard for protocol. 

To make things worse, Waltz was supposedly funneling official government communications into his personal Gmail account. That’s right;  schedules, sensitive attachments, the works—all hitting his private inbox before he manually pushed them into Signal group chats. Imagine the digital paper trail—or lack thereof. Forget secure government systems. He treated those like dial-up relics while rerouting national security through a free download from the app store.

But the rot ran even deeper. After the Yemen/Signal leak blew open, some enterprising journalists took a dive through commercial data broker sludge and unearthed Waltz’s personal phone number, old passwords, and even his handles on other encrypted platforms like WhatsApp. That’s not just sloppy—that’s reckless. This wasn’t a one-off mistake. It was a digital security implosion waiting to happen and I’m sure the President was pissed from day one of the foul ups.

And while Signal chats are supposed to have self-destruct settings to limit the damage, Waltz made sure to extend his message auto-deletion windows from one week to four. That’s four weeks of potentially classified chatter hanging around in cyberspace, taunting the Presidential Records Act like a middle finger on fire. Federal law requires official communications to be preserved—not ghosted like a bad Tinder date.

The cherry on top? Trump didn’t want to fire him. According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump dragged his feet because he didn’t want to give The Atlantic—the outlet that blew open the Yemen leak—the satisfaction. Think about that. National security be damned; the real concern was not letting a liberal rag score political points. Had Breitbart broken the story, Waltz would’ve been shown the door so fast his Green Beret would still be spinning in the air like a Looney Tunes hat.

This was bad judgment on steroids and it morphed into an institutional failure. Waltz didn’t trip into this mess—he built it, brick by encrypted brick. He made Signal the backbone of the NSC’s daily operations and left government protocols in the dust because they were “inconvenient.” In doing so, he took the country’s most sensitive secrets and dragged them into unsecured spaces where they were vulnerable to leaks, hacks, and basic human stupidity. And he got away with it far longer than he should have. That’s not just a scandal. One could go so far as to call it sabotage by convenience.

Internal Turmoil and Political Pressures

Mike Waltz wasn’t the only body to hit the tarmac after the fallout from the Signal disaster. His deputy, Alex Wong, who also had his fingerprints all over the infamous Yemen chat, got the boot as well, right alongside him. No surprise there—when the boss goes down in flames, the right-hand man usually follows, especially when he’s in the same Signal thread helping steer the missile talk.

But that was just the start. Looking back, April saw a full-blown purge at the National Security Council. At least 20 staffers were shown the door, including some top brass. David Feith, the senior director for technology and national security, got tossed—kind of ironic considering the whole mess was a technological self-own.

Brian Walsh, director for intelligence, also didn’t survive the month. Thomas Boodry, who handled legislative affairs, was axed. Maggie Dougherty, who worked on international organizations, gone. Even a resilience director—someone supposedly responsible for foreign threat preparedness—was quietly removed. You’d think in an era of Russian brinkmanship and Chinese gray zone warfare, they might want to keep someone like that around, but apparently not.

And then came the first wave in early April—a brutal slash-and-burn that wiped out over 15 staffers across critical policy divisions. Latin America, South Asia, biosecurity—you name it, they gutted it. Legislative affairs? Barely standing.

The NSC’s teams on Latin America and international organizations were left so hollowed out you could hear an echo in the hallways. The White House tried to spin it as a “streamlining” effort, but no one outside their echo chamber bought it. What it looked like was a loyalty cleanse, pure and simple. I haven’t seen a cleanse this thorough since that misguided trip to an LA health spa.

And wouldn’t you know it—Laura Loomer’s name pops up in the middle of it. The far-right flamethrower handed Trump a hit list of “disloyal” staffers in an April 3 Oval Office meeting. VP JD Vance and Chief of Staff Susie Wiles were right there with her, nodding along like bobbleheads in a sporting goods store. The result? A political loyalty test masquerading as national security policy. Trump wanted soldiers, not simply staff. And if you’d ever questioned the man or posted a lukewarm tweet in 2016, well, you were probably toast.

Meanwhile, this housecleaning hit at the worst possible time. Tensions with Russia are flaring up again over Ukraine. NATO was undergoing a dramatic restructuring. There were real geopolitical fires breaking out, and the folks with the matches were too busy flipping desks and reading resumes to put them out. Critics warned the exodus would create gaps in institutional knowledge—and they’re not wrong. You can’t just pluck a new Latin America advisor off LinkedIn and expect them to steer delicate hemispheric diplomacy.

In the end, this was more than simple damage control. It was demolition. What started as a scandal about unsecured messaging turned into a full-scale purge of the National Security Council. Time to rebuild and make the NSC great again.

The Aftermath: A Cautionary Tale

Waltz’s departure serves as a dark reminder of the importance of adhering to established protocols, especially in matters of national security. The use of unsecured communication channels for sensitive information not only jeopardizes operations but also undermines public trust.​ Signal may be fine for day to day comms or organizing a weekend trip with buddies, but that’s about it.

As the administration seeks a replacement, names like Steve Witkoff, a real estate developer and current special envoy, have surfaced. The choice will undoubtedly reflect the administration’s priorities and approach to national security moving forward.​

Lessons Learned

The ‘Signalgate’ scandal underscores the perils of complacency and the critical need for vigilance in safeguarding potentially classified information. Waltz’s fall from grace is a cautionary tale for all public officials about the consequences of neglecting established security protocols.​

As the administration navigates the fallout, the focus must shift to restoring integrity and ensuring that such breaches do not recur.

The nation’s security, our security, depends on it.​