WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration’s new top officials have begun questioning career officials who work at the White House National Security Council about who they voted for in the 2024 election, their contributions policies and whether they have published social media posts that could be taken into account. incriminating by President-elect Donald Trump’s team, according to a US official familiar with the matter.
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At least some of these apolitical employees began packing their belongings after being questioned about their loyalty to Trump – after receiving indications that they would be asked to remain at the NSC in the new administration, the official said, expressing. on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters.
Trump’s pick for national security adviser, Florida Rep. Mike Waltz, has publicly signaled in recent days his intention to get rid of all non-political appointees and career intelligence officials serving at the NSC before the Inauguration Day to ensure the council is made up of those who support Trump’s agenda. .
A mass withdrawal of foreign policy and national security experts from the NSC on the first day of the new administration could deprive Trump’s team of considerable expertise and institutional knowledge at a time when the United States is grappling with difficult political challenges in Ukraine, the Middle East and beyond. Such questioning could also make new policy experts recruited to the NSC less likely to speak out on policy differences and concerns.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan is making a strong case for the incoming Trump administration keeping career government employees assigned to the NSC, at least until the new administration begins.
“Given everything that’s going on in the world, making sure that we have a team in place that’s up to the task and, you know, ready to continue serving at 12:01 a.m., 12:02 p.m., 12:03 p.m. on the 20th is really important,” he said. Sullivan said Friday.
The NSC staffers questioned about their loyalties are largely subject matter experts who have been loaned to the White House by federal agencies — the State Department, FBI and CIA, for example — for missions temporary which generally last one to two years. If they were removed from the NSC, they would be returned to their original agency.
The vetting of officials began last week, the official said. Some of them were questioned about their policies by Trump appointees who will serve as NSC director and who had asked them weeks earlier to stay. There are dozens of officials at the NSC leadership level who had planned to remain at the White House in the new administration.
A second U.S. official told the AP that he was informed a few weeks ago by new Trump administration officials that they planned to ask questions of career appointees who work in the White House, including those of the NSC, on their political leanings. The official, who was not authorized to comment publicly, had not yet been formally investigated.
Waltz told Breitbart News last week that “everyone is going to resign at 12:01 a.m. on January 20.” He added that he wants the NSC to be staffed “100 percent aligned with the president’s agenda.”
“We’re currently working on our process to get everyone’s permissions and the transition process,” Waltz said. “Our people know who we want in the agencies, we submit those requests, and in terms of details, they’re all going to go back. »
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A Trump transition official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters, said the new administration believes it is “entirely appropriate” to seek officials who share the new president’s vision and focusing on common goals.
The NSC was launched as an arm of the White House during the Truman administration, charged with advising and assisting the president on national security and foreign policy matters and coordinating between various government agencies. It is common for experts assigned to the NSC to move from one administration to another, even when the White House changes parties.
Sullivan said he had not spoken to Waltz about the personnel issue and said it was “up to the next national security adviser to decide how they want to play things.” All I can say is how we did it and what I think worked.
“When they are selected to come to the country, they are not selected on the basis of their political affiliation or political views, but on the basis of their experience and capabilities. So we have a real diversity of people in terms of their points of view, their abilities. the politics, their backgrounds,” Sullivan said of those assigned to the NSC. “The common element of all of this is that we’re getting the best of the best here” from agencies including the State Department, the intelligence community, the Pentagon, and the Departments of Homeland Security and Treasury.
Sullivan noted that when Biden took office in 2021, he inherited most of his NSC staff from the outgoing Trump administration.
“These people were awesome,” Sullivan said. “They were really good.”
Trump, during his first term, was scarred when two career military officers assigned to the NSC became whistleblowers, raising concerns about Trump’s call to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2019, in which the president called for an investigation into Biden and his son Hunter. This episode led to Trump’s first impeachment.
Alexandre Vindman was listening to the call in his role as NSC official when he was alarmed by what he heard. He contacted his twin brother, Eugene, who was an ethics attorney at the NSC at the time. Both Vindmans raised their concerns with their superiors.
Alexander Vindman said in a statement Friday that the Trump team’s approach to staffing the NSC “will have a chilling effect on senior government policymakers.”
He added: “Talented professionals, fearing dismissal for principled positions or objective advice, will self-censor or forgo their services altogether. »
Both men were held up by Democrats as patriots for speaking out and ridiculed by Trump as insubordinates. Eugene Vindman was elected as a Democrat in November to represent Virginia’s 7th Congressional District.