Almost immediately after becoming president, Donald Trump made all kinds of strange decisions, but one of the toughest to defend was his appointment of Chief White House Strategist Stephen Bannon — up until recently, a guy who ran a right-wing website — to a full seat on the principals committee of the National Security Council.Rep. Rick Larsen (D-Wash.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, said soon after, “This is a ‘Holy Crap’ moment.’”The concerns grew more acute soon after when Foreign Policy reported that Steve Bannon had begun “calling the shots” at the NSC, “doing so with little to no input from the National Security Council staff.” The magazine quoted an intelligence official who described the NSC’s work environment as one in which there’s “little appetite for dissenting opinions” and “shockingly no paper trail of what’s being discussed and agreed upon at meetings.”That was just nine weeks ago. As of today, however, Bannon has been removed from the NSC.
President Donald Trump has removed Steve Bannon, his chief strategist, from the National Security Council, according to a filing in the federal registry. […]A senior White House official told NBC News that the changes were not the result of any “power struggle” within the administration.Bannon was put on the Principals’ Committee only as a check against then-National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, the official said. Now that Flynn is gone, Bannon is no longer needed in that role, the official said.
