Incoming National Security Advisor on Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal, mass deportations and TikTok

WASHINGTON (CBS, KYMA/KECY) - Representative Mike Waltz (R-FL), incoming National Security Advisor to President-Elect Donald Trump, spoke with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation Sunday about the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal.

Brennan said Waltz met with some of the families of some of the hostages being held in Gaza on Saturday, with "at least hree Americans assessed to still be alive and in captivity," and one of them not being released until phase two "when male soldiers are released and Israeli troops withdraw."

This prompted Brennan to ask Waltz if the Trump administration will "see this through to completion," to which Waltz said:

"Remember the terms of the deal that we finally have come to was inherited in many ways, from the Biden administration. So, it was actually the Biden negotiators that were at the table, and the other side was dealing with them, but kind of looking to us, particularly Steve Witkoff, President Trump's Middle East envoy. And one of the things that we inherited was this framework of women, the elderly and the sick coming out first...one of the Americans is an Israeli soldier...that means he'll come out in the second phase, but we will get [Edan Alexander] out period. And I am convinced...that this deal would have never happened had President Trump not been elected. The Trump effect, so to speak, the families believe that they were effusive and their thanks for him and...in the truth that he put out that put Hamas on notice, that there will be consequences if they don't let our people go."

Talks then came to the possibility of a two-state solution, which Brennan asked Waltz if President-Elect Trump supports it even though Hamas and "the far right in Israel" doesn't want it, and Waltz replied saying:

"President Trump's plan and his first term, his plan for the Middle East and his plan for Israel and Palestine had a pathway to a two-state with all kinds of very important qualifiers that had to be in place beforehand. Stop radicalizing the next generation of Palestinian youth. Very specifics...components of that plan in terms of how things would be divided up, but I do think we can get to the next round of the Abraham accords. I do think we can expand it, and that will be between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which will be tremendous. That has been a main goal of the Netanyahu government now for years....for President Trump, if in a short amount of time, if we're talking about infrastructure projects, ports, rails, fiber, data center, if we're talking about all of those things, these historic animosities will become smaller and smaller and smaller, and that is the piece that he seeks, and that only he can lead."

During the interview, Brennan and Waltz talked about what is to come in the next few weeks in regards to Trump's mass deportation plans, with Brennan asking Waltz if he can say anything about the "scope and scale of the roundups" that Americans should expect.

"I think they're going to be quite aggressive. Number one. Number two, they're going to go after these criminal gangs that are terrorizing our cities, particularly MS-13, and particularly Tren De Aragua, our communities are asking for it. Our neighbors are asking for it," Waltz answered.

Brennan then followed up by saying that one of the Tren De Aragua is Venezuelan, and the U.S. can't deport them back to Venezuela.

When asked where he's going to send them, Waltz said, "We're in a number of conversations with a number of countries that will agree to take them."

Brennan and Waltz then talked about TikTok going offline Saturday, but the company said Sunday its services were coming back online after President-Elect Donald Trump provided assurances necessary to the company's service providers, and that the president-elect said he would issue an executive order to delay when the law that bans the app would go into effect.

When asked if the executive order would pose as a risk, and how is he going to prevent China from "siphoning up and spying on Americans," Waltz said his the author of the law, former Representative Mike Gallagher, saying that the "goal was never to eliminate TikTok," but have Americans use the app and "make it safe from Chinese communists."

"So what we need between now and Monday is to buy the president some time to evaluate those deals. And if it goes dark, that's going to be, obviously, extremely problematic. So both can be true. We can have an app that Americans enjoy, but at the same time that protects their data and protects them from outside influence and undue influence. And that's the time and space that the President is seeking. And as a deal maker, I think we all should be confident that he can craft that kind of a deal."

Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), Incoming National Security Advisor to President-Elect Donald Trump

To watch more of Brennan's interview with Waltz, click here.