ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (AP) — President Donald Trump said Friday that he wants his new acting director of national intelligence, Bill Pulte, to cut the office, which has already been significantly scaled back during his second term.

Trump noted that the size of the office has been “way too high for way too long” and that “if he cut, I wouldn’t mind that.”

“He’ll do a very good job,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One as he traveled to Wisconsin for an event on agriculture. “He’ll watch it closely, but Bill Pulte is very good, he’s very talented.”

The Republican president said in an earlier interview with The Wall Street Journal that he has asked Pulte to start the process of firing employees. In the interview, Trump said he has already conveyed his view to Pulte, who has served as head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency but has no apparent national security expertise.

“I’d like to see it smaller. I think there are a lot of people in there that shouldn’t be there,” Trump said, which the Journal said was in reference to intelligence community officials who had served in the Democratic administrations of Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama.

Trump told the Journal that he wants Pulte to “start the process” of firing personnel and that the eventual permanent director of national intelligence should continue it. The president has indicated that he would not formally nominate Pulte for the position.

“Frankly, it might be good for him to shake it up before people come,” Trump said. “Because, if he (Pulte) reduced the size, in conjunction with me … and in conjunction with possibly the person coming in … he can do a lot of the hard work and we wouldn’t have to saddle somebody that goes in.”

Pulte was tapped by the president earlier this week in a surprising move that has been met with bipartisan resistance in the Senate, which confirms presidential nominations. The temporary appointment has now snarled the renewal of a critical national security surveillance program on Capitol Hill, with Democrats key to the vote pointing out that they did not trust Pulte — whose office oversees 18 intelligence agencies — to help administer the surveillance program.