Anton's departure comes amid a series of changes at the National Security Council, including former US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton taking the helm on Monday after HR McMaster stepped down as Trump's top National Security Adviser (NSA), reports CNN. He pointed out the fact that Bolton was starting in the midst of an urgent situation with Syria, adding: “Interesting day.”

Inevitably, Bolton’s past statements in public jobs and as a Fox News commentator follow him into the job. At the White House press briefing Monday, spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked about a comment Bolton made in 2013 on "Fox and Friends" — he said he would have opposed a congressional vote to use military force in Syria. Michael Anton, who also worked for former President George W. Bush’s National Security Council and is a former BlackRock managing director, is leaving after serving under Trump for more than a year, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement. Although the White House said Trump thanked Anton for his service, two people familiar with the situation said he resigned after learning he would be fired, and his departure marked another moment of upheaval in an administration marked by months of in-fighting and high-level departures. Bolton is also very hawkish on Iran, and he and Trump may look to tear up or renegotiate the 2015 nuclear deal signed by former President Barack Obama and other western powers with Tehran to stop its nuclear weapons programme. In the weeks since being named to the post, Bolton has quietly sought to calm concerns that he would push a more militaristic, hawkish approach on the president, considering his previously expressed support for pre-emptive military action against North Korea and regime change in Iran. McMaster, Bolton privately told some foreign embassies and influential foreign policy experts that he planned to approach the job more like a traffic cop, guiding a decision-making process in which the president can hear competing views, said individuals familiar with those conversations who weren’t authorized to discuss them and requested anonymity. Frank Gaffney, a longtime Bolton associate and former Reagan administration official who runs the far-right think tank Center for Security Policy, said Bolton views his role as “to help the president get his program implemented.” Bolton has been “preparing his whole life to be in this job,” Gaffney said. Anton told Politico news site: “I will be forever grateful to President Trump for the opportunity to serve my country and implement his agenda.”

Anton was known for a famous piece he wrote in the run up to the 2016 election, in which he had rallied conservatives by arguing that “a Hillary Clinton presidency is Russian roulette with a semi-auto”, while with a Trump presidency “at least you can spin the cylinder and take your chances”. “But I wanted ‘line’ responsibility - to manage something and to change it, not simply to be ‘staff,’ even at the White House.”

Bolton’s start comes after the tortured exit for McMaster, Trump’s second national security adviser, a three-star general who never developed a strong personal bond with the president. While the White House said McMaster’s exit had been under discussion for some time and stressed it was not due to any one incident, it came after months of speculation about his future in the administration.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders announces the departure of National Security Council spokesman Michael Anton.