Mike Waltz, President Donald Trump’s national security advisor, had his Venmo friends list public until Wednesday when the White House was asked about it, according to a new report from Wired. The list included 328 people, including lobbyists, journalists, and members of the military, according to the news outlet. And that kind of information would obviously be tremendously useful for any foreign adversary, a term that may be difficult to define these days as Trump turns America’s longstanding friends into enemies.
The news about Waltz’s Venmo list comes as the former congressman from Florida has done his best to deflect from another operational security scandal that’s blown up this week. Waltz accidentally added the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, Jeffrey Goldberg, to a Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb targets in Yemen. The Trump regime has tried to insist nothing was classified, though the messages were released by Goldberg on Wednesday and seem highly sensitive.
And that seems to the running theme for Waltz’s short tenure as national security advisor, whether it’s Signal chats or Venmo friend lists. Politicians can quibble about the technical definition of classified, but even if the Signal chats about Yemen weren’t strictly falling in that definition (though they probably were), they were sensitive enough that America’s geopolitical enemies would find the data quite useful. Waltz’s Venmo list is just like that.
Waltz’s friends list on Venmo reportedly included some of the most powerful people in the U.S. government right now, including White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and national security council staffer Walker Barrett, both of whom were members of the Signal group chat about bombing Yemen, which had been dubbed the “Houthi PC small group.” Wired reports that Wiles also had her friends list public until the outlet reached out to the White House about it; her list included folks like Attorney General Pam Bondi.
It doesn’t sound like any of Waltz’s transactions were public, but the friends list alone could allow any threat actor to develop a social map that would be useful. Waltz’s list also included plenty of people who are not public figures, which can help make connections that would be even more valuable–anything from shopping patterns to medical concerns.
There were also a number of journalists in Waltz’s Venmo friends list, according to Wired, including Bret Baier and Brian Kilmeade from Fox News as well as CNN journalists Brianna Keilar and Kristen Holmes. Vice President JD Vance had his Venmo friends list exposed in the summer of 2024, also by Wired; his list included plenty of people who were architects of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 plan to destroy the country.
It seems like a solid bet that Waltz’s security lapses will continue to pile up, if history is any guide. As just one example of how things could go sideways for the national security advisor, German magazine Der Spiegel reported Wednesday that contact information and passwords for Waltz and other top intelligence officials had also been available online, which could hypothetically be used to target accounts and devices of high-ranking members of the Trump regime. It’s not immediately clear how many of the credentials were current or exploitable. But you know countries that wish the U.S. harm are working on it.
The U.S. has been taken over by fascist thugs who are destroying old alliances with liberal democracies while cozying up to dictators around the world. Trump has threatened countries like Panama, Greenland, and Canada, insisting that he wants to make Canada the 51st U.S. state. And things aren’t looking any better domestically, as Trump rounds up valid visa holders for expressing support for Palestinians. Footage emerged on Wednesday of secret police arresting
Things are bound to get much worse before they get better. And completely unqualified clowns like Waltz are going to keep making them worse, even as they pull historically stupid mistakes like inviting journalists into super-secret group chats for planning wars. And leaving their Venmo friends public.
