The following is a transcript of an interview with Rep. Michael Waltz, Republican of Florida, Trump’s pick for national security adviser, on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” broadcast December 15, 2024.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We start with Congressman Mike Waltz of Florida, who is the new White House national security adviser. Hello to you.
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ (R-FL): Hello. Daisy. Tough day for the military, but great day for America.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Indeed. Well, as a Green Beret, I know you had a reason to cheer for the military, sir. I want to ask you a number of things, but before you go overseas, you serve on the House Intelligence Committee. Because of your new role, you are also in contact with President Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan. Do you think the public should be concerned about these drones being reported all over the East Coast? And do you need more authority to deal with it?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, I think what the drone issue highlights is gaps in our agencies, gaps in our authorities between the Department of Homeland Security, local law enforcement and the Department of Defense. And I think it’s hard for Americans to believe that we can’t understand where these things come from. And I can tell you that from the Department of Defense’s perspective, you know, they’re focusing on bombers and cruise missiles, and– and that’s– it shows gaps in our capabilities and in our capability to suppress what is happening here. And we need to get to the bottom of this, and I think the Biden administration is working to do that.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But at this point, given the information that you’ve seen, is there any reason for the public to be concerned?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, look, when you have sensitive sites like Picatinny Arsenal, you have of course President Trump’s residence in Bedminster, and you have other no-fly zones, those need to be enforced. We need to know who is behind this. But right now, I think law enforcement seems to be…the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense are kind of doing this and pointing fingers at each other. So when we intervene, you know, how can we enforce these low-altitude, long-loitering drones that could be dangerous? And one thing that people have to appreciate, you know, they’re evolving so quickly, it’s not necessarily someone who’s right on the other end driving it. They could follow pre-positioned GPS coordinates. They could come from abroad. And we must carefully consider the defense of our territory. President Trump has spoken of an Iron Dome for America. This must also include drones, not just adversary actions like hypersonic missiles. We need protection of American airspace from all of the above.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Understood. Let me ask you about China. The president-elect said a few things last week about China, and he said his team had “talked and discussed,” as he put it, with Chinese President Xi Jinping. CBS was first to report that an invitation had been extended to the inauguration, although we don’t expect Xi to come. Was that the extent of the back and forth? Do the two leaders plan to speak by telephone?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, Margaret, it’s been incredible. I mean, the whole world is reaching out to the president. It was actually a little overwhelming to do the outreach, not only talk to him, congratulate him, but even come to the inauguration themselves. So the awareness has been great. President Trump answers all calls, as you know. He believes in the importance of maintaining relationships with allies and adversaries at this level of head of state. And these conversations – these conversations are happening, but they’re really nothing more than congratulations and niceties. We are in communication with the current administration. We don’t agree on everything, but as I said before, none of our opponents should think that now is the time to take advantage of this transition. We don’t agree on everything, but we are in full coordination with the current administration.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, China, you said there should be consequences because of the massive and pervasive hack of eight U.S. telecommunications companies, which breached the metadata of potentially millions of Americans. Sen. Marco Rubio said it was egregious, dangerous and a vulnerability no one anticipated. You will work together. What consequences do you foresee?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ I think Senator Rubio, and hopefully future Secretary of State Rubio, is absolutely right. We have tried, over the years, to play a better defense when it comes to cybersecurity. We need to start going on the offensive and start imposing, I think, higher costs and consequences on private actors and state actors who continue to steal our data, who continue to spy on us, and what’s even worse , with the penetration of the Volt Typhoon, which are literally putting cyber time bombs on our infrastructure, our water systems, our networks and even our ports. This is completely unacceptable and I think we need to take a much stronger stance. Senator Rubio is right. President Trump also indicated this. We need to start changing the behaviors of the other side, rather than constantly having this kind of escalation of their offense and our defense. The Colonial Pipeline hack was another key point. And finally, we have a tremendous private sector with many capabilities. This relationship between public and private, with our technology industry, could do a lot of good and help…
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, are these sanctions?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: …we defend, but that also makes our opponents vulnerable.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Are these day one sanctions from the Trump administration?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, I’m not going to preempt everything we do from day one, but take a different approach to cybersecurity, look at our doctrine and start imposing costs on the other side to strike at the door. This is something we’ll look at, I think.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You were at Mar a Lago last week when Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán met with Mr. Trump, Elon Musk and you. He then announced that he had spoken to Vladimir Putin. Orbán appears to be proposing a Christmas ceasefire and prisoner exchange. Does it carry some kind of message from Donald Trump?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, Orbán has regular relations with the Russians and he clearly has a good relationship with President Trump, and I hope that the whole world will want to see some sort of cessation of the massacre that is taking place in eastern Ukraine. I mean, Margaret, people need to understand…
(CROSSTALK START)
MARGARET BRENNAN: Did Mr. Trump ask her to do this?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: It’s World War I style.
(END OF CROSSTALK)
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: It’s a World War I style war. It’s a meat grinder of human beings. President Trump is very concerned about the ongoing carnage. And where is all this going?
MARGARET BRENNAN: That’s right.
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: We have to stop the fighting. And, you know, look, if it’s some sort of ceasefire as a first step, again, we’ll look carefully at what that means. But until January 20, we are also in coordination with this current administration.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay, so no message was sent to Putin through Orbán by Trump. That’s… that’s what I understand you’re saying there.
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Oh, I’m not going to – yeah, I’m not going to go into detail about the back and forth. But if we talk, of course we’re going to keep talking, and President Trump has made it clear that he wants this war to end.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is the Trump team considering limiting how Ukraine can use U.S. weapons or target U.S. aid when they take office?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, President Trump just said in the interview that, you know, a blank check, in his interview with Time magazine, I believe, you know, a blank check is not- you know, is just not a strategy. . It’s a kind of eternal war that we seem to be retreating into. What does success look like based on our interests? How to end the war? Who is at the table? How do we bring, you know, all parties to the table, and what’s the framework for an agreement? These are things we are thinking about with the fantastic team he is putting together.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Was this discussed in the 45-minute meeting that Mr. Trump had with Mr. Zelenskyy in Paris last week? And are you in favor of NATO member states playing the role of peacekeepers in Ukraine?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Well, you know, what’s been so interesting, Margaret, is that since the election, everyone who has been coming to us, our European allies, President Zelensky at this meeting, and others, turned to the way of… this framework that I just talked about. about. How to end this conflict? How can we do this in a way that restores stability, stops the carnage, and hopefully makes it a permanent end, not just a pause? These are all things we think about. And regarding the question you just asked, the Secretary General of NATO came here to Mar a Lago, he talks about the Europeans playing a bigger role, whether on the ground or otherwise, once this conflict is over, and that’s exactly what President Trump asked for.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I have to ask you quickly about the Middle East. Under the last Trump administration, Donald Trump withdrew some US troops from Syria. Does he intend to keep the 900 American soldiers there?
REPRESENTATIVE. MIKE WALTZ: Look, our number one interest is maintaining control over ISIS. We cannot see another explosion of ISIS into a caliphate that threatens Iraq, threatens Jordan, threatens Turkey and Europe, inspires attacks in the United States, as we saw in 2014 President Trump then cleaned up the situation with his team. Thousands of ISIS fighters are in prison camps. We are also in consultation with the Israelis. It’s mostly about destroying Assad’s chemical stockpiles, as well as other things that we don’t want to get into anyone’s hands. And you know, the other thing that he asked for in his first term, and that we need to see, is, again, that Europe, which has been hit so hard by the attacks of the Islamic State, is playing a greater role in containing ISIS. So these are all conversations that we’re having, again, in consultation with the current administration, and we’ll see going forward.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Congressman Mike Waltz, thank you for being with us today.
