Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center under Donald Trump, announced his immediate resignation on Tuesday, objecting to the decision to go to war with Iran despite, as he stated, “no imminent threat” to the United States.
Kent, who was nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate last year, shared his resignation letter on X, saying he “cannot support sending the next generation to fight and die in a war that offers no clear benefit to the American people or justifies the loss of American lives.”
- Joe Kent is a former Green Beret and CIA operator who just resigned as the Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, citing his inability to support the administration’s military strikes in Iran.
- Kent referenced his history as a combat veteran — and as a widower whose Navy cryptanalyst wife had been killed in an ISIS bombing in Syria
- The former Army warrant officer’s resignation comes shortly after his narrow confirmation by the Senate, a process marked by sharp opposition from Democratic lawmakers who described him as “patently unqualified” and accused him of promoting conspiracy theories and espousing white supremacist views.
- Kent was also among the officials in the March 2025 Signal chat leak, an incident in which sensitive war plans were discussed on Signal and inadvertently shared with the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic.
- His tenure in the administration followed a stint as a foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign, as well as a four-year period during which he mounted two unsuccessful bids for a congressional seat in Washington.
US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said it was a “good thing” that Joe Kent resigned as director of the US National Counterterrorism Center, criticising the outgoing official as “very weak on security” after the latter stepped down in protest over America’s war with Iran.
