Friday Briefing: A White House Shake-Up

Trump removed his national security adviser

President Trump announced yesterday that he was removing his national security adviser, Michael Waltz, naming Secretary of State Marco Rubio as his interim replacement. It was the first major personnel overhaul of top White House aides, and the kind of move he had wanted to avoid in his second term.

Waltz had been on thin ice since he organized a group chat on the app Signal to discuss a sensitive military operation in Yemen and accidentally included a journalist. Trump has nominated Waltz to be U.S. ambassador to the U.N.

But even before the group chat leak, most of Trump’s advisers viewed Waltz as too hawkish to work for a president who was eager to reach a nuclear deal with Iran and normalize relations with Russia.

Rubio will hold both positions for now, something that no other official has done simultaneously since Henry Kissinger held the titles under the Nixon and Ford administrations.

What’s next: The selection of the next national security adviser will be a critical one, at a moment when the president’s top aides have differed sharply on how to handle China, Russia and Iran.

Here’s what’s in the Ukraine-U.S. minerals deal

The U.S. and Ukraine signed a deal late Wednesday allowing the U.S. to receive future revenue from Ukraine’s natural resources. Ukraine hopes it will clear the way for continued U.S. support.

The agreement, the text of which was made public yesterday, did not mention security guarantees, which Kyiv had wanted. Under this bargain, U.S. military aid in the future would have to be matched with Ukraine’s resource wealth. The deal also appears to keep the door open for Ukraine to eventually join the E.U. Here’s what we know.

What’s next: Ukraine’s parliament still has to ratify the agreement, which will probably happen in the next two weeks, lawmakers said yesterday.

Analysis: It’s not clear how the deal will work in practice. It could bring untold money into a joint investment fund, but the resources will take years to extract and yield profits.

Working to calm India-Pakistan tensions

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday spoke separately with Pakistan’s prime minister and India’s foreign minister as tensions soared after a terrorist attack last week in Kashmir left 26 people dead. Rubio said the U.S. was committed to “cooperation with India against terrorism,” but urged the two countries, which are both nuclear powers, to work together. The U.N. offered to mediate.

Pakistan has claimed it has “credible intelligence” that India is planning to attack, and promised a forceful response. India has not commented on any such plans.

Kashmir: A tourist on a zip-line filmed the attack. See the video and read more about the territory.

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