US. President Donald Trump has sacked national security adviser Michael Waltz weeks after he erroneously added a civilian journalist to a Signal group where sensitive Yemen military operations and tactics were discussed.
Mr Trump is also sacking Mr Waltz’s deputy, Alex Wong, well weeks after the Signal group drama embarrassed his administration.
Mr Trump first backed Mr Waltz stating he was a “good man” who had “learnt his lesson.”
But the controversy of the Signal leak cast a pall on Mr Waltz’s leadership and called into question his capacity to be efficient as the nation’s security head.
Mr Waltz’s woes began on March 24 when The Atlantic’s journalist Jeffrey Goldberg published a piece detailing his erroneous addition to a Signal group chat with Vice President J.D. Vincent, defence secretary Pete Hegseth and other high-ranking security officials.
He published the report while leaving out sensitive military operations he was privy to learn in the group. But Mr Hegseth’s public rebuttal that there were no sensitive details in the chat prompted Mr Goldberg to later publish the military tactics discussed on the group, all of which matched the U.S. strike in Yemen.
Mr Trump was back to shopping for a new NSA with the ouster of Mr Waltz who was picked to replace Matt Gaetz.