Ousted national security aide to join Justice Department

A former National Security Council aide who was ousted last year during a period of turnover on President Trump’s NSC has joined the Justice Department as an adviser to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Ezra Cohen-Watnick, a former liaison between the White House and the intelligence community, first entered the spotlight amid controversy in March 2017 over his reported contact with House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif. Cohen-Watnick was named as the staffer who passed information to Nunes about potential surveillance abuses that occurred during the Obama administration, and Nunes later passed that information onto Trump, causing a firestorm that resulted in Nunes’ recusal from his panel’s Russia investigation.