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It always comes back to Russia.
Signalgate is a scandal that hasn’t gone away. The White House has done everything imaginable to sweep it under the rug, but the scandal and national security issues continue to keep popping up.
At first glance, it seems that Michael Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, will be taking the fall, because he organized the infamous Signal chat where a journalist from The Atlantic was accidentally added, but buried within The New York Times story was an interesting nugget:
Mr. Waltz, a traditional Republican hawk who never made the public evolution toward Mr. Trump’s foreign policy views that Secretary of State Marco Rubio did, has been arguing internally for sharp sanctions against Russia if it fails to agree to a cease-fire with Ukraine. Mr. Waltz made that suggestion as recently as Monday at a meeting with the president and senior members of his national security team.
So far, Mr. Trump has been reluctant to take anything but symbolic action against Russia, though at times he has threatened on social media to impose sanctions and tariff
Waltz seems to have mistakenly believed that when Trump said America First, he meant that America would be put first.
It sure seems like Russia’s interests have been put ahead of those of the United States during the second Trump administration.
Just to be clear, Pete Hegseth, who leaked the war plans not only to The Atlantic journalist but also to his wife and brother, still has a job. Pete Hegseth remains the Secretary of Defense, but the guy who has been pushing the administration to sanction Russia if they don’t agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine is out.
Waltz definitely deserves to be fired over Signalgate, but so does Hegseth and everyone else involved with the chat and the leaking of war plans.
It doesn’t matter who Trump replaces Waltz with because this administration has no coherant or consistent national security policy, but whoever Trump picks likely won’t want to sanction Russia.
What do you think about Trump firing Waltz? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
