In early April, the Trump administration took the extraordinary and unprecedented step of firing the National Security Agency’s director and deputy director, seemingly without cause, leading to some awkward questions about who, exactly, was leading the NSA.
NBC News reported soon after that Donald Trump made this decision after meeting with far-right activist Laura Loomer, who expressed “dissatisfaction” with some on the president’s national security team. Indeed, after Trump fired the top two officials at the National Security Agency, Loomer took credit for their dismissals.
In recent days, it apparently happened again.
The New York Times reported that the NSA’s top lawyer, former general counsel April Falcon Doss, was also removed from her position late last week for an eerily familiar reason:
On July 23, the Daily Wire, a conservative website, wrote about Ms. Doss and her former work for the Senate Intelligence Committee’s Democratic staff. Later that day, Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist, amplified a social media post critical of Ms. Doss that cited the Daily Wire article. In a text message on Tuesday, Ms. Loomer said that she had ‘reposted a tweet that exposed her last week and flagged it for the right people.’
Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, wasted little time in condemning the developments.
“We should be outraged by the firing of April Doss, a deeply principled public servant, apparently for the role that she played in the Senate Intelligence Committee’s bipartisan investigation into Russian election interference,” the Virginia senator said in a statement. “Her dismissal appears to be the result of a politically motivated smear campaign driven by a far-right conspiracy theorist, not any legitimate concern about her conduct or qualifications. Undermining experienced, nonpartisan professionals like April weakens our national security and makes it harder to protect the country from real threats.”
When Warner mentioned a “far-right conspiracy theorist,” he was, of course, referring to Loomer.
As this story was unfolding, the public also learned that Dr. Vinay Prasad, the Food and Drug Administration’s top vaccine and gene therapy official, has also resigned. The New York Times reported that his departure followed “a public campaign against him led by the right-wing influencer Laura Loomer.”
Soon after, NBC News reported that the Justice Department had dropped a federal case against Fat Brands, a prominent restaurant chain operator, on the heels of the White House taking the unusual step of firing Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Schleifer, a career federal prosecutor who was involved in the case.
The prosecutor was ousted, NBC News added, after he was targeted by “Trump supporter Laura Loomer.”
On the surface, these disparate stories — one at the NSA, another at the FDA, another still at the Justice Department — might appear unrelated. But the common thread isn’t exactly hiding well: A right-wing influencer is exercising breathtaking influence over Trump’s team.
Indeed, these latest developments follow Loomer’s one-on-one meeting with Vice President JD Vance last month, which followed Loomer playing a direct role in firing members of the White House National Security Council.
For those who might need a refresher, Loomer is a right-wing activist, a radical conspiracy theorist and a failed Republican congressional candidate who has described herself as “pro-white nationalism.” She was also a close confidant to Trump during the 2024 campaign — even joining the Republican for a Sept. 11 remembrance, despite the fact she’s pushed false conspiracy theories about the terrorist attacks having been “an inside job.”
As a New York Times report summarized in April, Loomer is “viewed as extreme by even some of Mr. Trump’s far-right allies.”
Why was there so much focus on Trump’s partnership with Loomer during the campaign season? Because of fears she’d have outsized influence in the White House, despite — or more to the point, because of — her radical and fringe views.
Those concerns were, we now know, entirely correct.
Media Matters’ Matthew Gertz put it this way in an item published to Bluesky: “If you had said in October that if Trump were elected he’d end up purging the NSC at the behest of Laura Loomer and ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to fire the director of the NSA, you’d have been accused of having a terminal case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
And yet, here we are.
Indeed, the president hasn’t even made much of an effort to deny Loomer’s influence, boasting to reporters last month that the conspiracy theorist is “a very good patriot” who makes “recommendations” he takes seriously.
If there’s a compelling defense for this, I can’t think of it.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
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