--- title: Trump Orders National Security Council Staff Cut After Whistleblower description: President Donald Trump has ordered a substantial reduction in the staff of the National Security Council, according to White House sources. canonical: https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/ author: TIME article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-10-05T17:25:33.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:03:51.263Z article:section: Politics og:title: Trump Orders Substantial Cut to National Security Council Staff After Whistle-Blower Complaint og:description: About 310 people currently work at the National Security Council og:url: https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte68f942a9f2742a4/698a03de929fadd3d6bf5037/doanld-trump-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Trump Orders Substantial Cut to National Security Council Staff After Whistle-Blower Complaint twitter:description: About 310 people currently work at the National Security Council twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte68f942a9f2742a4/698a03de929fadd3d6bf5037/doanld-trump-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Trump Orders Substantial Cut to National Security Council Staff After Whistle-Blower Complaint > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: Democrats Launched an Impeachment Inquiry Into President Trump. Here's What That Means [Watch (HLS stream): Democrats Launched an Impeachment Inquiry Into President Trump. Here's What That Means](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/MLzyDn3X.m3u8) (3:27)  _Published 2019-09-30. Democrats Launched an Impeachment Inquiry Into President Trump. Here's What That Means_ by [Jennifer Jacobs and Justin Sink / Bloomberg](https://time.com/author/bloomberg/) ## Jennifer Jacobs and Justin Sink / Bloomberg Contributor Oct 5, 2019 5:25 PM UTC  President Donald Trump speaks to the press before boarding Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House on October 4, 2019, in Washington, D.C. Trump has ordered a substantial reduction in the staff of the National Security Council, according to White House sources. President Donald Trump speaks to the press before boarding Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House on October 4, 2019, in Washington, D.C. Trump has ordered a substantial reduction in the staff of the National Security Council, according to White House sources.The Washington Post—The Washington Post/Getty Images by [Jennifer Jacobs and Justin Sink / Bloomberg](https://time.com/author/bloomberg/) ## Jennifer Jacobs and Justin Sink / Bloomberg Contributor Oct 5, 2019 5:25 PM UTC President Donald Trump has ordered a substantial reduction in the staff of the National Security Council, according to five people familiar with the plans, as the White House confronts an impeachment inquiry touched off by a whistle-blower complaint related to the agency’s work. Some of the people described the staff cuts as part of a White House effort to make its foreign policy arm leaner under new National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien. The request to limit the size of the NSC staff was conveyed to senior agency officials by acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and O’Brien this week. The whistle-blower complaint, focused on Trump’s conduct in a July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, has been followed by damaging reports on the president’s private conversations with other world leaders. The New York Times has reported that the whistle-blower was a CIA officer who was at one point detailed to the White House. The complaint has become the driving motivation behind House Democrats’ impeachment effort, which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi began last week. Two of the people familiar with the decision to shrink the NSC insisted it was largely rooted in both the transition to O’Brien’s leadership as well as Trump’s desire to increase efficiency at the agency, which grew under former President Barack Obama. About 310 people currently work at the NSC. All of the people asked not to be identified because the plan to reduce the NSC’s size hasn’t been made public. Late Friday, Trump re-tweeted an allegation that the whistle-blower was a CIA official who had been assigned to the NSC under President Barack Obama. Bloomberg News has not verified that assertion. The reductions will primarily be carried out through attrition, as staffers return from assignments at the NSC to their home agencies, the people said. Many people who work at the council are career government professionals detailed from the Pentagon, State Department, and intelligence agencies. Members of Congress have periodically sought to reduce the size of the NSC in recent years. Some lawmakers have threatened to make the national security adviser a Senate-confirmed position if the administration didn’t reduce the number of people working at the president’s foreign policy shop. Created under President Harry Truman in 1947, the NSC is an interagency panel designed to provide the president with subject-matter experts who can offer advice on foreign policy. O’Brien took over the NSC last month after his predecessor, John Bolton, departed the administration after high-profile disputes with Trump and Secretary of State Michael Pompeo over Afghanistan, North Korea and other matters. There was also frustration among some West Wing officials about perceptions the NSC was leaking information to benefit Bolton. Earlier this week, O’Brien appointed Alex Gray, formerly the National Security Council’s Oceania and Indo-Pacific security director, to be a senior adviser, according to three people familiar with the plan. Gray’s appointment follows that of Matt Pottinger, who is now deputy national security adviser after serving previously as the NSC’s senior director for Asia. Pottinger, a former journalist and Marine who joined Trump’s National Security Council in 2017 and later became senior director for Asia, has been deeply involved in U.S. talks with North Korea over its nuclear weapons program, and helped to plan Trump’s meetings with the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/"},"headline":"Trump Orders Substantial Cut to National Security Council Staff After Whistle-Blower Complaint","datePublished":"2019-10-05T17:25:33.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T08:03:51.263Z","description":"About 310 people currently work at the National Security Council","url":"https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/","keywords":["White House","Bloomberg","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte68f942a9f2742a4/698a03de929fadd3d6bf5037/doanld-trump-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jennifer Jacobs and Justin Sink / Bloomberg"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte68f942a9f2742a4/698a03de929fadd3d6bf5037/doanld-trump-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House","caption":"U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House","creditText":"The Washington Post—The Washington Post/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5693566/trump-cut-national-security-staff/","name":"Trump Orders Substantial Cut to National Security Council Staff After Whistle-Blower Complaint"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Democrats Launched an Impeachment Inquiry Into President Trump. 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