To suggest that the pace of staff departures from the White House these days warrants a quip about the building having a revolving door at the front of it would be an understatement. The brisk pace at which senior staff members have left the Trump administration has stayed up as its gone into its second year, and now, POLITICO has a report about the latest individual to plot their exit — National Security Council spokesman Michael Anton.
Anton is leaving the administration, unlike some, on good terms with the president and his remaining staffers, commenting:
‘I will be forever grateful to President Trump for the opportunity to serve my country and implement his agenda.’
Anton revealed Sunday that he would be leaving the White House but did not immediately specify an exact date for his departure. Sunday is two days after H.R. McMaster’s last day on the job as the president’s national security adviser; the general is being replaced by former United States Ambassador to the United Nations and noted war hawk John Bolton on Monday.
Anton is leaving the White House to take a position in the private sector; he’s going to serve as a writer and lecturer at Hillsdale College’s Kirby Center in Washington, D.C.
Commenting about his move to the private sector, Anton said:
‘The education I received and the friends I made are — apart from my family and my country — the most cherished things in my life. I am delighted to be returning to my first love and second family.’
Hillsdale College President Larry Arnn is, in turn, happy to welcome Anton to his institution, commenting:
‘I have known Michael for just about his entire adult life. His devotion to learning, his love of his country, and his talents of thinking, talking, and writing will make him a valuable colleague. We are proud to welcome him to the Kirby Center.’
Anton was initially brought onto the administration under the president’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, after having defended the president during the campaign season. Flynn himself was among the first to leave the Trump administration, pushed out after it came out that he’d been lying about the content of his communications with the now former Russian Ambassador to the United States. Flynn has since faced charges for lying to the FBI about those communications.
As for Anton, POLITICO notes that among the prominent points in his recent background is an essay he published in which he called the 2016 presidential race the “Flight 93 election,” comparing the ascent of Donald Trump to prominence to the effort of the passengers on United Flight 93 during the 9/11 attacks to wrest the plane from hijackers.
Anton has long backed the president, and he’s announced his plans to leave the administration as the commander-in-chief faces an array of continued national security challenges.
For instance, he agreed earlier this year to meet with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un, an agreement coming in the face of an ever burgeoning nuclear program on the part of the North Koreans, and the Syrian government was also recently reported to have carried out a chemical weapons attack on its own people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htwokN-aqvA
Of course, considering some of his past comments, it’s not as though the president could have been expected to draw from whatever wisdom Anton had to offer in the first place.
Featured Image via Xinhua/Ting Shen via Getty Images
