President Donald Trump said Thursday that he would nominate national security adviser Mike Waltz to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
“From his time in uniform on the battlefield, in Congress and, as my National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz has worked hard to put our Nation’s Interests first. I know he will do the same in his new role,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Trump said Secretary of State Marco Rubio would act as “interim” national security adviser.
Waltz, a former Florida congressman, has been on shaky ground with Trump since March after he inadvertently added a journalist to a private chat on the messaging app Signal with other top national security officials to discuss military strikes in Yemen. Three sources with knowledge had said earlier Thursday that Waltz and deputy national security adviser Alex Wong were expected to leave the administration.
White House officials declined to comment when asked about the expected departure of Waltz and Wong.
Trump had initially nominated Rep. Elise Stefanik for the high-profile U.N. ambassador post, but withdrew her nomination in late March, citing Republicans’ razor-thin majority in the House. “She is phenomenal, number one. She is a friend of mine,” Trump said at the time, but “we have a slim margin. We don’t want to take any chances.”
Unlike the national security adviser role, U.N. ambassadorship requires Senate confirmation. Waltz’s involvement in the Signal mishap will likely be a source of contention in the Senate confirmation process.
Screenshots of the Signal chat shared by The Atlantic showed that a user named “Michael Waltz” initially added the magazine’s top editor, Jeffrey Goldberg, to the high-level discussion.
Waltz took responsibility for the incident in an interview in March with Fox News.
“I take full responsibility. I built the — I built the group,” Waltz told host Laura Ingraham. “My job is to make sure everything’s coordinated.”
Trump publicly stood by Waltz in the days after The Atlantic report, telling NBC News, “Michael Waltz has learned a lesson, and he’s a good man.”
But speaking with reporters from The Atlantic last week, Trump was less steadfast. Trump said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who also participated in the group chat, was “safe.”
“Does he stay longer than Mike Waltz?” The Atlantic’s Ashley Parker asked.
“Waltz is fine,” Trump said. “I mean, he’s here. He just left this office. He’s fine. He was beat up also.”
Michael Waltz at the White House on Thursday.
Despite Trump’s public support of Waltz, he vented privately about his frustration with him in the days after the incident became public, two Republican sources with knowledge of the conversations told NBC News at the time.
Waltz did not appear to be present at a Rose Garden ceremony Thursday morning attended by the president and many other senior administration officials, and was not mentioned in Trump’s remarks welcoming attendees.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Waltz deserved to lose his job, and called for Hegseth, who discussed details about the attack in the Signal chat, to be the next to go.
“Look, they should fire him, but they’re firing the wrong guy. They should be firing Hegseth,” Schumer said.
Waltz paid tribute to Trump at a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
“We’ve had 100 days of your leadership, with respect, with strength,” Waltz said. “It’s an honor to serve you in this administration, and I think the world is far better and far safer for it.”
As a congressman, Waltz aligned himself with traditional conservative foreign policy views, though his stance on Ukraine moved closer to Trump’s.
Republicans in Congress who favor continued U.S. military aid to Ukraine viewed Waltz as a counterweight to Vice President J.D. Vance and others in the administration who have a more skeptical view of Kyiv and its cause.
Waltz’s efforts to shape a coherent approach to the Ukraine war and other international challenges were often undermined by Trump’s improvised, unpredictable leadership style.
Before the November election, Waltz had argued for quickly wrapping up the war in Ukraine and said that if Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected peace talks, the U.S. should then ramp up weapons deliveries to Ukraine. But so far, Trump has not embraced that idea and has regularly focused his ire on Ukraine and its president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Waltz’s influence was also diminished by Trump’s reliance on special envoy Steve Witkoff, whom the president has dispatched to hold talks with Putin as well as leaders in the Middle East.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com