Representative Mike Waltz, President Trump's choice to lead the National Security Council, said in an interview published Thursday that all current civil service members of the NSC who are detailed from another agency are expected to be out of the building as soon as Trump is sworn in.

“Everybody is going to resign at 12:01 on January 20,” Waltz said. “We’re working through our process to get everybody their clearances and through the transition process now. Our folks know who we want out in the agencies, we’re putting those requests in, and in terms of the detailees they’re all going to go back.”

What Waltz, a retired Special Forces colonel, is reacting to is the obstruction and leaks from the NSC staff on loan from other agencies that damaged Trump's agenda in his first term. He plans to get rid of people who may have made a career as part of the "interagency process" and have more loyalty to that process than they do to Trump. These people will be backfilled by other people, also detailed from agencies, but who have been vetted and handpicked by Waltz and his deputies.

Needless to say, not everyone is happy, not the least of which is one retired Army lieutenant colonel named Alexander Vindman.

Statement on National Security Staff Firings

Yesterday, President Trump’s National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz @michaelgwaltz , announced a sweeping directive to terminate all national security staffers loaned from other departments and agencies who serve in apolitical,…

— Alexander S. Vindman 🇺🇸 (@AVindman) January 10, 2025

Yesterday, President Trump’s National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz @michaelgwaltz, announced a sweeping directive to terminate all national security staffers loaned from other departments and agencies who serve in apolitical, non-partisan senior staff roles. Waltz framed this decision as a means to eliminate Biden-era appointees and enforce absolute alignment with Trump’s policy agenda. Notably, Waltz justified this move by referencing my role in exposing Trump’s abuse of power, which led to his first impeachment. Using my actions as a rationale, Waltz aims to purge scores of professionals from the Department of Defense, Department of State, CIA, and other agencies—not because of their conduct, but due to a demand for blind allegiance to Trump. This approach sends a stark and troubling message: in a second Trump administration, only political loyalists will be permitted to serve on the NSC. 

To set the record straight, I served as an apolitical detailee and a faithful Army officer 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 of corruption—my refusal to remain silent as Trump engaged in criminal activity, undermined free and fair elections by pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rival, Joe Biden, to steal the 2020 election—and my refusal to betray my oath to the U.S. Constitution are why I was fired. These are the same reasons professional staff are about to be purged, and apolitical staff will be barred from the NSC. 

Nah, you were fired for leaking a privileged conversation to a co-conspirator who then had himself labeled a "whistleblower" to create a fake fact case for impeaching President Trump. And also for being a treasonous oxygen thief.

On the surface, it is reasonable for a president to seek a loyal and trusted teams faithful to their agenda. However, absolute loyalty should not be the exclusive qualification, overriding competence, experience, and fidelity to a constitutional oath. An NSC staffed with “team members who are 100% aligned with the president’s agenda” will not only diminish the NSC’s capabilities but also erode continuity in policy. Worse, it will create an environment where dissenting views, even those grounded in experience and ethical responsibility, are stifled. 

There is an admitted danger in groupthink. We can see that in the way the Biden NSC has coddled Iran, China, and Russia in the misguided view that in some bizarro universe, they would become useful members of the international community. Dissent doesn't need to be hashed out at the staff level. Also, I don't think anyone in the Trump administration is interested in "continuity of policy" with Biden because his foreign policy failures, both active and in terms of missed opportunities, are the stuff of legend.

The so-called “Vindman Rule” sets a dangerous 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 the government. Talented professionals, wary of being dismissed for principled stances or offering objective advice, will either self-censor or forgo service altogether. This undermines the very purpose of the NSC: to provide the president with the best possible advice as well as the coordinating team to advance U.S. national security interests. 

You have to admire how Vindman categorizes himself as a "talented professional" who was dismissed for taking "principled stances or offering objective advice." Actually, the role of making policy in civil service is the realm of political appointees. The career staff are supposed to serve every president loyally. The last thing needed in the NSC are staffers who are first and foremost loyal to "the way we've always done it," who are overly concerned about the agency "equities" at stake when decisions are made, and who see themselves as players in policy in their own right.

The implications of this loyalty-above-competence model are dire. By purging the NSC of apolitical, experienced professionals, Trump and Waltz are hollowing out the institutional expertise required to navigate complex global challenges. This will create a policy apparatus incapable of discerning sound policies from reckless impulses—or worse, one that actively disregards legal and ethical obligations to implement Trump’s personal whims. Consider the implications: Would Department of Defense detailees still counsel against invading Greenland or Canada or feed those foolhardy thoughts to curry favor? Would FBI detailees agree to engage in political reprisals against Trump’s enemies to serve in the NSC? These are not far-fetched concerns but real dangers inherent in the precedent Waltz establishes. 

This, of course, is a strawman constructed by someone with terminal TDS. More to the point, who really cares what staffers from Defense or the FBI would counsel? What evidence do we have from the last four years that the NSC provides the institutional expertise required to navigate complex global challenges? If Vindman is concerned about "reckless impulses," he should look at Biden removing sanctions from Iran and letting it have access to billions in cash or the decision to allow the Houthis to shut down one of the key maritime chokepoints or the utter fiasco that took place during our withdrawal from Afghanistan.

This announcement also presages broader plans by the Trump administration to fire tens of thousands of senior apolitical 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, jeopardize U.S. national security, and weaken U.S. democracy.

There is no evidence that Trump plans on firing "tens of thousands of senior apolitical government officials." There is a lot of evidence that the Democrat apparatchiks who are part of the "resistance" and who have burrowed themselves into the civil service as a way of obstructing a Republican president's agenda are heading for a Hobbesian “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” existence.