Joe Kent, a top counterterrorism official, resigns citing Iran war

The head of the National Counterterrorism Center has resigned in protest over the war with Iran. Joe Kent, an Army veteran who completed 11 combat deployments to the Mideast and elsewhere, said he "cannot in good conscience" support the war.

He said that Israel pushed the U.S. into the conflict with a pressure campaign to "deceive" President Trump, and that Iran "posed no imminent threat to our nation."

He shared his resignation letter in a social media post.

Kent ran two unsuccessful congressional bids in Washington state as a Republican and Trump loyalist. He said in his resignation letter that he supported "the values and the foreign policy" that Trump campaigned on.

"Until June of 2025, you understood that the wars in the Middle East were a trap that robbed America of the precious lives of our patriots and depleted the wealth and prosperity of our nation," Kent wrote to Trump in the letter.

Kent's wife, Navy Senior Chief Petty Officer Shannon Kent, died serving in Syria in 2019.

Kent called on Trump to "reflect upon what we are doing in Iran, and who we are doing it for." He said Trump could "reverse course and chart a new path for our nation, or you can allow us to slip further toward decline and chaos. You hold the cards."

In response, Trump said Tuesday he "always thought" Kent was a nice guy but also "was weak on security, very weak on security."

"I didn't know him well, but I thought he seemed like a pretty nice guy, but when I read his statement, I realized that it's a good thing that he's out because he said that Iran was not a threat. Iran was a threat every country," Trump said during an Oval Office event.

Trump nominated Kent as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in February 2025. The Senate confirmed him to the position in July 2025, 52-44, without Democratic support. Ahead of his confirmation, numerous reports detailed his links with extremist figures, including to people affiliated with the Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer, both far-right extremist groups.

In 2021, Kent spoke with Nick Fuentes, a neo-Nazi who has become influential within younger ranks of the GOP, about the possibility of assisting with his congressional campaign social media strategy. Kent later tried to distance himself from that call and said he had no further associations with him.

The senior vice president of the pro-Israel political nonprofit J Street, Ilan Goldenberg, said Kent's warnings of an Israeli conspiracy to deceive the U.S. "plays on the worst antisemitic tropes."

"Donald Trump is the President of the United States and he is the one ultimately responsible for sending American troops into harms way," Goldenberg wrote on X, noting his own opposition to the war.

Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, similarly said he agrees with Kent's opposition to the war, while noting he did not support Kent's nomination.

NPR's domestic extremism correspondent Odette Yousef contributed to this report.
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