The White House has confirmed it has inadvertently added a journalist to a group chat where senior US officials discussed plans for a military strike against the Houthi rebel group in Yemen, fueling a political uproar.
Editor-in-Chief of The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, reported he received an invite on the encrypted messaging app Signal from an account labeled White House National Security Adviser Michael Waltz to a message group, which apparently included Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Goldberg noted that he had been added to the message chain, apparently by accident.
Goldberg said he had seen classified military plans for US strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen, including weapons packages, targets and timing, two hours before the strikes occurred.
The Trump administration acknowledged the messages, sent over the non-government encrypted app, seem to be authentic without offering an explanation as to why senior officials were discussing classified information outside of approved classified government systems.
Almost immediately, senior officials began to review the use of Signal amid concerns that Trump administration officials were relying too heavily on the app for their communications that involves sensitive government work.
“Everyone is on Signal, all day and night,” one official told CNN on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations at the West Wing. “That may well change.”
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who according to the Atlantic sent “operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, denied on Monday evening that war plans were discussed over text despite earlier acknowledgement by the White House that the texts appear authentic.
“Nobody was texting war plans and that’s all I have to say about that,” Hegseth told reporters when asked why these details were inadvertently shared with Goldberg, after landing at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii. The defense secretary also criticized the Atlantic journalist and described him “deceitful and highly discredited.”
On Monday afternoon, President Trump told reporters that he “doesn’t know anything about the group chat.”
Critics call for an investigation on how the journalist was added to the group chat over the Yemen Strikes
The apparent leak has been fueling a political uproar, with Democratic lawmakers demanding an investigation, casting the episode as a national security scandal.
“This is one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence that I have read about in a very, very long time,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said.
Senate Armed Services Committee chairman Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, said his panel planned to investigate the matter.
“It’s definitely a concern,” he added. “It appears that mistakes were made.”
The use of Signal to discuss planning for military operations, among the most closely guarded secrets the United States has in part because of the potential impact on American service members, is a shocking risk to national security, current and former officials told CNN.
“They broke every procedure known to man about protecting operational material before a military strike,” said a former senior intelligence official.