House Republicans are pushing to cuts the size of the White House National Security Council amid bipartisan concern that the staff has ballooned during the Obama administration, expanding beyond its original mission to manage policy. Now it’s setting policy, they say, often with little outside oversight or input.
“In too many cases, its traditional role of ‘honest broker’ has evolved to a policy-making role — it has even undertaken secret diplomatic negotiations — all done out of Congress’ view,” House Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce, R-Calif., said during a Thursday hearing.
Royce said the NSC staff has grown from 100 people at the beginning of President George W. Bush’s presidency to more than 400 today, resulting in foreign policy and military operations that are run out of the White House to the exclusion of the Cabinet.
Royce charged that President Obama’s move to normalize relations with Cuba was “secretly” conducted by two NSC staffers.
“Secretary of State Kerry was not informed of these negotiations until the discussions were well underway, and State Department officials in charge of the region found out only as negotiations were all but done,” Royce said.
One witness, Derek Chollet, a former NSC official in the Obama administration, said the staff is already shrinking without the need for legislation from Congress.
Chollet, now a senior policy adviser for the German Marshall Fund, said the number of the NSC members is closer to 200 people, and getting smaller.
“Some of the widely-cited higher numbers of the Obama NSC staff size reflect the back-office functions, like those staffing the White House Situation Room, the records management personnel, as well as the integration of the Homeland Security Council in 2009.”
Chollett noted that the NSC staff remains relatively small compared to other national security offices, such as the State Department Office of the Secretary, which he said is twice as large, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which has seven times the staff.
“My understanding is that with the current downsizing under way, and there’s been about a 15 percent cut in NSC staff since January 2015, the NSC staff size that Obama will leave next year will be the same as what he inherited from President Bush in 2009.”
Royce said the concern is not just about the size of the NSC staff, but its role.
“It seems to me the NSC should return to its original mission of managing the development of policy options for the President of the United States. If that can be the end game here, I think we can get back to its original function.”
