Only a few hours ago, Mike Waltz was speaking to US media in his capacity as national security advisor .

Speaking to the Fox News morning show Fox & Friends, Waltz praised Trump’s administration for modernising the military and getting US troops the right equipment.

“This is exactly what our modern force needs as it moves out of those protracted Middle East wars to deal with the modern warfare that we’re seeing, from space to cyberspace to drones to missiles,” he said.

“All of those in the hands of our war-fighters now.”

Tom Gerken
Technology reporter

As we wait to hear from President Trump this morning, here’s what you need to know if not familiar with Signal app.Signal has estimated 40-70 million monthly users – making it pretty tiny compared to the biggest messaging services, WhatsApp and Messenger, which count their customers in the billions.

Where it does lead the way though is in security.

At the core of that is end-to-end encryption (E2EE).

Simply put, it means only the sender and the receiver can read messages – even Signal itself cannot access them.

Its owners say it collects far less information from its users, and in particular does not store records of usernames, profile pictures, or the groups people are part of.

But even that level of security is considered insufficient for very high level conversations about extremely sensitive national security matters.

That is because there is a largely unavoidable risk to communicating via a mobile phone: it is only as secure as the person who uses it.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from the White House

Things at the White House are a bit chaotic this morning, where we already had a busy start reporting on the aftermath of the Ukraine-US minerals deal announcement.

Officials, so far, have been quiet on reports of Waltz’s departure, noting – not for the first time – that they do not comment on reports based on anonymous sources.

An announcement of this magnitude, however, will almost certainly come from Trump himself – so we’ll all be watching his upcoming National Day of Prayer event.

He will also be flying to Alabama later today to deliver a commencement speech and may well speak to reporters on-board Air Force One, or on departure or arrival.

For most of us who cover the White House on a day-to-day basis,Waltz’s departure – again, if confirmed – will perhaps be no surprise.

Earlier in the administration, Waltz was a fixture outside the Oval Office, often stopping to chat to us after doing early morning TV hits.

But following “Signalgate” – for which he was largely blamed – he became a much more rare presence.

The role of national security adviser is key to the president – they are the principle adviser on national security issues and on US response to foreign threats.

As of now, there’s a lot to juggle, including the war in Ukraine, the Israel-Gaza war and Iran’s nuclear position.

When appointing Waltz, Donald Trump described him as an “expert on threats posed by China, Russia, Iran and global terrorism”.

In his previous term, Trump fired three of the four he chose to serve in that position.

Reacting to the reports about Waltz leaving his post, Democrats in the House Oversight Committee say they will continue to investigate the Administration’s “carelessness with national security”.

In a post on X, they wrote that Waltz “should’ve been fired months ago” along with Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The committee is is the main investigative committee in the US House of Representatives.

Mike Waltz was seen entering the White House this morning, before reports came out suggesting he is leaving his role as national security adviser.

He waved to the media congregated outside and greeted a security guard before heading inside.

It was just about 24 hours ago when key members of the Trump administration assembled around a long table at the White House to lavish praise on their boss’s accomplishments in the first 100 days.

Vice-President JD Vance and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth were also in the room as each member took turns listing their achievements..

When it was National Security Adviser Mike Waltz’s turn, he told the president that his leadership had been conducted with “respect” and “strength”.

“It’s an honour to serve you in this administration,” he said.

“Thank you very much Michael,” the president replied.

Things appear to have changed since then.

Waltz is the first high profile official to exit Trump’s administration which just crossed 100 days yesterday.

His position had become tenuous after it was revealed that he accidentally added a journalist from The Atlantic magazine to a message group where plans for military strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen were discussed.

Waltz said he took ‘”full responsibility” for the signal leak.

In late March, Atlantic magazine editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg reported that he was accidentally added to a Signal chat by a user named Mike Waltz.

In this chat were top-ranking administration officials, accounts identified as being Vice-President JD Vance and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Goldberg says he saw classified military plans for US strikes in Yemen, including weapons packages, targets and timing, two hours before the bombs struck.

Waltz initially said he didn’t know how Goldberg came to be in the chat, but took “full responsibility” in an interview with Fox News, as he said he is the one who “built the group”.

Sources told the BBC’s US partner CBS News and the Guardian that Waltz had been trying to add a top spokesman to the Signal chat when he inadvertently added Goldberg instead.

They said investigators found that Goldberg’s number had been accidentally saved in Waltz’s phone as an alternative contact for national security spokesman Brian Hughes.

President Trump ultimately said he would “look into” the issue.

Michael Waltz, who US media reports has just left his post, was Donald Trump’s national security adviser. He was among Trump’s first appointments after his election.

Before the White House role, he was a congressman from Florida’s sixth congressional district from 2019 until he resigned in January to take up the new job with Trump.

In Congress, he served on the Intelligence, Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees.

He was previously an officer in the US Army and National Guard, retiring after 27 years with the rank of colonel.

Democrats have wasted no time in reacting to the reports that Mike Waltz its stepping down from his role as National Security Adviser.

“One less person who will put our troops in harm’s way and risk our national security,” Congresswoman Julie Johnson writes in a post on X.

Congressman Herb Conway simply writes: “Good start.”

And Congressman Eugene Vindman says they are “halfway there”, calling for Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth to also be let go.

US National Security Adviser Mike Waltz is stepping down from his role according to CBS, the BBC’s US news partner, and Reuters.

His deputy, Alex Wong, will also be leaving his post, the reports say.

The White House says it won’t comment on anonymous sources.

It comes weeks after Waltz took responsibility for a group chat in which high-ranking officials planned military strikes in Yemen in the company of a journalist who was inadvertently added.

This is the first major administration member to leave during Trump’s second term. We’ll bring you the latest on this breaking news when we have it.