Why the Right Hates the National Security State: The Historical Roots of Trump’s Assault on the NSC

Jun 11, 2025

Also published in Foreign Affairs
About the Authors
Michael Singh
Michael Singh

Michael Singh is the Managing Director and Lane-Swig Senior Fellow at The Washington Institute.

Articles & Testimony

The breaking of the national security state is indeed a crisis, but it also represents an opportunity to build a compromise approach tailored to the world’s present-day threats, similar to the situation policymakers faced immediately after World War II.

After a very public rift between billionaires, Elon Musk is on the outs with President Trump, but the goal of downsizing the federal bureaucracy remains deeply ingrained in the administration. At the end of May, for instance, in a move not apparently initiated by Musk or his staff, the Trump administration cut dozens of staff from the National Security Council, which advises the president on international affairs and coordinates the interagency policymaking process. This move—according to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who also replaced Mike Waltz to lead the NSC—is intended to make the council hew more closely to “its original purpose and the President’s vision.” But, according to Axios, an anonymous official put it more bluntly: “The NSC is the ultimate Deep State...We’re gutting the Deep State.” Critics argue that such drastic cuts will ultimately diminish U.S. influence in the world. Yet it is worth remembering that debates over the size and scope of the national security bureaucracy fit squarely in a long-standing American political tradition... 

Read the full article on the Foreign Affairs website.

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