WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump has moved to fire several White House National Security Council officials after being urged by far-right activist Laura Loomer to remove staffers she deemed insufficiently loyal to his “Make America Great Again” agenda, according to several people familiar with the situation.
Loomer presented her research to Trump in an Oval Office meeting on Wednesday, making her case for the firings, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to sensitive personnel matters.
According to the sources, Vice President JD Vance, Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and Sergio Gor, Director of the Presidential Personnel Office, attended the meeting.
NSC spokesman Brian Hughes declined to comment on the meeting or the firings, stating that the White House does not discuss personnel issues.
The Presidential Personnel Office has taken steps to remove at least three senior NSC officials as well as several lower-level aides.
Loomer, who has promoted 9/11 conspiracy theories, was a frequent campaigner for Trump’s successful 2024 White House bid. More recently, she has spoken out on social media about some members of Trump’s national security team who she believes cannot be trusted.
“It was an honor to meet with President Trump and present him with my research findings,” Loomer wrote on X. “I will continue working hard to support his agenda, and I will continue reiterating the importance of, and the necessity of STRONG VETTING, for the sake of protecting the President of the United States of America, and our national security.”
Trump has a long history of elevating and associating with those who trade in falsehoods and conspiracy theories, and he frequently amplifies posts on his social media site shared by those like Loomer who promote QAnon, an apocalyptic and convoluted conspiracy theory based on the belief that Trump is fighting the “deep state.”
Trump’s decision to fire staff comes as Waltz is fighting back against calls for his removal after using the publicly available encrypted Signal app to discuss planning for the sensitive March 15 military operation targeting Houthi militants in Yemen. Trump has said he supports Waltz.
A journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic magazine, was mistakenly added to the chain and revealed that Trump’s team used it to discuss the precise timing of the operation, aircraft used to carry out the strikes, and other details.
Waltz has taken responsibility for creating the text chain, but he is unsure how Goldberg was included.
According to one person familiar with the situation, Loomer complained to sympathetic administration officials prior to Wednesday’s meeting with Trump that she had been excluded from the NSC vetting process as Waltz expanded his staff.
She believes Waltz was overly reliant on “neocons” — shorthand for the more hawkish neoconservatives within the Republican Party — as well as “not-MAGA-enough” types, the person said.
In the first few days of Trump’s return to the White House, Waltz returned approximately 160 nonpolitical detailees assigned to the NSC to their home agencies to ensure personnel were committed to implementing Trump’s America First agenda.
The decision to sideline nonpolitical experts on topics ranging from counterterrorism to global climate policy comes at a time when the United States is dealing with a diverse set of complicated foreign policy issues, including conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.
According to a source familiar with the situation, Adam Schleifer, an assistant US attorney in Los Angeles, was fired without explanation in a terse email from the White House Presidential Personnel Office last week, shortly after Loomer made a social media post about him.
