Mike Waltz to quit as Trump’s National Security Advisory over Signal chat leak controversy: Reports

US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who is in controversy for sending details of airstrike plans in the messaging app Signal, will step down from his post, US media reported on Thursday.

Mike Waltz on March 26 had claimed "full responsibility" for mistakenly adding the journalist to the group chat in which top American officials discussed impending strikes in Yemen.

"I take full responsibility. I built the group; my job is to make sure everything's coordinated," Waltz had told Fox News host Laura Ingraham, adding that he does not personally know Goldberg, the journalist who was added to the chat.

A far-right ally of the president, Laura Loomer, has also targeted Waltz, telling Trump in a recent Oval Office conversation that he needs to purge aides who she believes are insufficiently loyal to the “Make America Great Again” agenda.

Waltz's deputy, Alex Wong, is also expected to depart, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a personnel move not yet made public. The National Security Council did not respond do a request for comment.

Waltz, who served in the House representing Florida for three terms before his elevation to the White House, is



the most prominent senior administration official to depart since Trump returned to the White House.

In his second term, the Republican president had been looking to avoid the tumult of his first four years in office, during which he cycled through four national security advisers, four White House chiefs of staff and two secretaries of state.

The Signal chain also showed that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth provided the exact timings of warplane launches and when bombs would drop.

Waltz had previously taken “full responsibility” for building the message chain and administration officials described the episode as a “mistake” but one that caused Americans no harm. Waltz maintained that he was not sure how Goldberg ended up in the messaging chain, and insisted he did not know the journalist.

Trump and the White House — which insisted that no classified information was shared on the text chain — have stood by Waltz publicly throughout the episode.

But the embattled national security adviser was also under siege from personalities such as Loomer, who had been complaining to administration officials that she had been excluded from the vetting process for National Security Council aides.