White House National Security Council to reduce staffing by a third
White House National Security Council to reduce staffing by a third
By Bryce Klehm
January 30, 2020 / 1:32 PM / CBS News
By February, the White House National Security Council (NSC), which is the executive branch office forum for national security, military and foreign policy issues, will be reduced to its lowest staffing levels in nearly twenty years.
President Trump's national security adviser, Robert O'Brien recently told NPR, "We'll probably have about 60 to 70 staffers who've gone back to their home agencies." That will effectively downsize the NSC by nearly a third from the staffing levels when O'Brien took the helm in September, bringing the total to just over 100 people.
The council is composed of employees on rotation from various national security agencies such as the State Department, Central Intelligence Agency, and Defense Department. Since its establishment in 1947, the NSC has helped presidents coordinate White House policy and responses to the nation's most pressing international issues, ranging from the Cuban Missile Crisis, the 9/11 terror attacks and issues of war.
O'Brien is Mr. Trump's fourth national security adviser, succeeding John Bolton. This administration has had no shortage of foreign policy challenges: the nuclear aspirations of North Korea and Iran, the decisions to kill ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani, the navigation of the trade dispute with China, and determining troop levels in Afghanistan.
Despite these challenges, the staff reductions are intentional. When O'Brien was taking over the NSC, he penned a Washington Post op-ed in which he committed to reduce the NSC by 174 policy positions, arguing that the council's objective is to "coordinate policy rather than run it." He said that the agency had "ballooned" under President Obama, when George W. Bush had half as many on staff, even with the prosecution of two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
But the executive council has also been in the spotlight recently because of the impeachment inquiry of President Trump. Current and former staffers, such as Ukraine expert Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman and Fiona Hill, the former top adviser on Russia and European affairs, have offered testimony that was critical of the president. Vindman, who still works at the National Security Council, even drew the ire of the White House Twitter account.
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