United States government group chat leaks

United States attacks in Yemen and Pete Hegseth, two of the high-ranking officials of the second Trump administration who were in the group chat Due to the Gaza war, the Houthi administration in Yemen began launching attacks on Israel and against international shipping in the Red Sea, including the bombing, hijacking and destruction of commercial vessels. In January 2024, the United States and United Kingdom began a series of airstrikes on the Houthis in retaliation. After assuming office in January 2025, the Trump administration claimed it would implement a more assertive response to Houthi disruptions of international shipping lanes than the preceding Biden administration had undertaken. Following the implementation of the January 2025 Gaza war ceasefire on January 19, the Houthis announced that they would stop attacking ships transiting through the Red Sea, except for ships affiliated with Israel. After Israel blocked humanitarian aid from entering Gaza, the Houthis resumed their attacks on March 11. On March 15, the United States launched another series of airstrikes on Yemen. These attacks were part of a campaign dubbed Operation Rough Rider by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, alluding to President Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders in the Spanish–American War. Signal messaging app , the software at the center of the leak Signal, a mobile messaging app, gained popularity among the general public, particularly after the 2024 Chinese telecommunications breach, thanks to features such as end-to-end encryption for all messages and voice calls by default, minimal data collection, and optional auto-deletion of messages. The US government discourages the use of Signal for official business because of records-retention laws and the app's security features possibly not working if the user's device is compromised. On March 18, 2025, the Pentagon sent a department-wide memo warning, "Please note: third party messaging apps (e.g. Signal) are permitted by policy for unclassified accountability/recall exercises but are NOT approved to process or store nonpublic unclassified information"—a category whose release would be far less potentially damaging than that about ongoing military operations. A former NSA hacker said that linking Signal to a desktop app is one of its biggest risks, as Ratcliffe suggested he had done. Past comments by Trump administration members Certain Trump administration members involved in the Signal group chat had previously criticized Hillary Clinton for her email controversy: Donald Trump in 2016 said that Clinton tried to "bypass government security" and "sent and received classified information on an insecure server, putting the safety of the American people under threat"; Pete Hegseth in 2016 said that America's allies would be "worried that our leaders may be exposing them because of their gross negligence or their recklessness in handling information", Stephen Miller in 2022 said that "foreign adversaries could easily hack classified ops & intel in real time" due to Clinton's use of "unsecured" communications; while Mike Waltz claimed Clinton was able to "delete 33,000 government emails on a private server". Other Trump administration members involved in the Signal group chat had also previously emphasized the need to strictly punish security breaches; Tulsi Gabbard on March 14, 2025, said: "Any unauthorized release of classified information is a violation of the law and will be treated as such", while John Ratcliffe stated in 2019: "Mishandling classified information is still a violation of the Espionage Act." == Members ==

The group's 19 members included these people, plus a CIA officer whose name The Atlantic withheld at the CIA's request: • Alex Wong, Principal Deputy National Security Adviser. • Jacob, identity unknown. • JD Vance, Vice President. • Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic. • Joe Kent, Acting Chief of Staff for the Director of National Intelligence, and nominee for National Counterterrorism Center Director. == Leak ==

On March 11, 2025, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz established a group conversation on Signal that included several high-ranking administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, CIA director John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard (identified as "TG"), Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent (identified as "Scott B"), presumed deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller (identified as "S M"), White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, and United States special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff. As he created the chat, Waltz also sent a Signal request to Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, to join the conversation. On March 13, 2025, Waltz added Goldberg to a private Signal group chat labeled "Houthi PC small group". Although his presence in the chat was visible to other members under the handle "JG", the other members were apparently unaware of his identity. The group initially exchanged messages about staffing arrangements, with principals designating representatives from their departments for coordination purposes. Just after midnight Moscow time, the chat named an active CIA intelligence officer; according to a Telegram post by Sergei Markov, Witkoff and Putin were in a meeting until 1:30 a.m. About 1:55 p.m. EDT on March 15, Goldberg verified through social media reports that explosions were occurring in Sanaa, Yemen's capital. After the strikes, group members exchanged congratulatory messages. The Waltz-associated account characterized the military operation as an "amazing job", while other accounts contributed affirmative responses. Goldberg observed the conversation without participating and eventually removed himself from the chat, which would have automatically notified the group members as of the time he left. Republican senators Mike Rounds (South Dakota) and Todd Young (Indiana) also said they would ask questions about the leak in the classified section of the hearing. On March 26, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence held a hearing in the same context, and they discussed the leak as well. Second Atlantic article In response to the Trump administration's claims that no classified material was shared in the Signal group, Goldberg and Shane Harris published a second article in The Atlantic on March 26. This article contained the full text of the exchanges that took place during the March 15 attack on the Houthis, omitting only the name of a CIA operative. This revealed that the exchange included specific timing of planned military strikes and real-time reports on their deployment. == White House internal investigation ==

Following the leak, the Pentagon launched an internal investigation on April 3, 2025, after a request from the United States Senate Committee on Armed Services. According to The Guardian, a "forensic review" by the White House information technology office discovered Goldberg had emailed the campaign in October 2024 regarding a story critical of Trump's attitude toward wounded service members. The campaign forwarded the email to Trump's then-spokesperson Brian Hughes, who copied and pasted the entirety of the email into a text message that he sent to Waltz. The content included a signature block with Goldberg's phone number. Waltz did not call Goldberg but saved Goldberg's number in his iPhone under the contact card for Hughes. The Guardian reported, "According to the White House, the number was erroneously saved during a 'contact suggestion update' by Waltz's iPhone", in which an algorithm suggests adding unknown numbers to existing contacts that it detects may be related. Following the election, Hughes became the spokesperson for the United States National Security Council. Waltz's error went undiscovered until Waltz attempted to add Hughes to the "Houthi PC small group" group chat and inadvertently added Goldberg instead. == Additional Signal group chats ==

On March 30, 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported that Waltz had hosted Signal group chats with Cabinet members on a number of topics, including Somalia and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. On April 2, 2025, Dasha Burns, writing for Politico, reported Waltz's team "regularly set up chats on Signal to coordinate official work on issues including Ukraine, China, Gaza, Middle East policy, Africa and Europe". Burns's four sources were either included in the group chats or had direct knowledge of them. All four reported seeing "sensitive details of national security work", but could not confirm their classification. titled "Defense | Team Huddle". This chat reportedly had information about the timing of airstrikes, and included Hegseth's brother, his wife and about a dozen other people. Officials speaking for the Pentagon stated that the informants were trying to sabotage Hegseth's agenda, and that "there was no classified information in any Signal chat". Former Pentagon official Evelyn Farkas opined that participants apparently "broke the law" in mishandling military secrets. Other security errors On March 26, 2025, the German magazine Der Spiegel reported that they were able to find private contact details and passwords for members of the group chat, including Gabbard, Hegseth, and Waltz, on the Internet. They did not publish this information, but informed the affected officials and the US Defense Department of their findings. The same day, Wired reported that Waltz's Venmo account was open to the public and that it was connected to hundreds of other people, including Susie Wiles and National Security Council staffer Walker Barrett. Security experts told Wired that knowledge of these connections could be exploited by foreign actors. The account was made private after this reporting. The Wall Street Journal then uncovered that Hegseth had brought his wife to two meetings with foreign military counterparts, even though attendees are typically limited to those with security clearances because of the sensitive information discussed. On April 1, 2025, The Washington Post reported that members of the National Security Council, including Waltz, have conducted government business over personal Gmail accounts, which is unencrypted. Drop Site News raised concerns over the potential for Israeli espionage given the IDF backgrounds of many key TeleMessage employees. 404 Media reported that a hacker was able to penetrate the TeleMessage server in "fifteen to twenty minutes", revealing DHS phone numbers and emails, and allowing capture of in-flight messages. On August 14, 2025, 404 Media reported that the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) had added a random user to an unencrypted Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) group chat titled "Mass Text". The chat contained sensitive information about an individual "seemingly marked for deportation," including their criminal history, Social Security number, and driver's license number. == Aftermath ==

American Oversight v. Hegseth, et al On March 26, a government watchdog group, American Oversight, filed suit in the District Court for the District of Columbia against Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard, John Ratcliffe, Scott Bessent, Marco Rubio, and the National Archives and Records Administration, alleging that they failed to abide by the Federal Records Act and the Administrative Procedure Act. The case was assigned to judge James Boasberg. The next day, the judge issued a temporary restraining order, telling the government to preserve all Signal communications from March 11–15 and to file a status report the next Monday with declarations specifying what steps were taken to preserve the messages. Boasberg is also presiding over another Trump administration case, J.G.G. v. Trump, involving use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan nationals who are alleged to be members of the criminal gang Tren de Aragua. Journalist Colin Kalmbacher noted that in that case, the administration told Boasberg that it would not provide him with information about the commercial flights used to take the Venezuelans to a prison in El Salvador, claiming a state secrets privilege, while in this case, the administration has publicly insisted that no classified national security information was divulged. Investigation into unauthorized disclosures On March 21, Hegseth's chief of staff, Joe Kasper, signed a memo that requested an investigation into "recent unauthorized disclosures of national security information involving sensitive communications", adding "the use of polygraphs in the execution of this investigation will be in accordance with applicable law and policy." The leaks under investigation included military operational plans for the Panama Canal, a second carrier headed to the Red Sea, Elon Musk's unusual visit to the Pentagon, and the pausing of the collection of intelligence to Ukraine. On April 15, 2025, Darin Selnick, who was the Pentagon's deputy chief of staff, was suspended, and Dan Caldwell, senior adviser to Hegseth, was escorted from the Pentagon. Hegseth had noted Caldwell as the best staff point of contact for the National Security Council as it prepared for the launch of strikes against the Houthis in Yemen. Both Defense Department officials' administrative leaves occurred amid allegations of leaking sensitive and classified materials. These claims reportedly contributed to the aides' firings. Fulcher denied the account. In March 2025, Forbes magazine found that Fulcher had apparently overstated his national security and business accomplishments. Inspector general probe In the aftermath of the Signal group chat leak, there were calls for an expedited inspector general review of the incident. On March 27, 2025, Senate Armed Services Committee chair Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) and ranking chairman Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) submitted a joint request to the Trump administration for an expedited IG assessment of whether or not Pete Hegseth and other DoD officials adhered to Pentagon policies, procedures, and classification requirements. In response to the request, on April 3, acting Pentagon inspector general Steven A. Stebbins announced in a notification letter to Hegseth that he was probing his usage of Signal in the group chat. The investigation has led to turmoil within the Defense Department, raising tensions and the firings and resignations of several top DoD officials, including former Chief of Staff Joe Kasper. On May 1, as news of the incident broke, the Pentagon inspector general expanded his investigation to include a second Signal group chat made by Hegseth that included members of his family. On December 3, the Inspector General submitted the classified version of its final report to Congress and released an unclassified version to the public the next day. While the Inspector General noted that Hegseth has the authority to declassify information and did not assess whether the information included in the chat was classified or was declassified properly, the investigation found that Hegseth's use of a personal device for official business violated department policy, that the information included in the chat originated from a document that was marked as classified at the time, and that Hegseth's use of Signal unnecessarily risked endangering military personnel and Operation Rough Rider itself. The report noted that Hegseth refused to be interviewed in-person, only provided written responses, and did not provide his personal device to be examined. == Reactions ==

Donald Trump Two hours after the article was released, as Trump was at a public event with Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry, he was asked about the leak; he said he was not aware of it. Trump has dismissed questions about firing those responsible for the incident, saying that the administration has "looked into it" and that it is "something that can happen". Initially, Trump said he did not know anything about Signal, later adding that it "was the best technology for the moment". Trump was critical of The Atlantic and called Goldberg a "sleezebag" who found the chat "very boring and he left early". He later criticized US District Judge James Boasberg, calling him "disgraceful" and accused him of "massive" Trump derangement syndrome, among other things. The judge had been assigned to oversee the case involving the chats, which Trump claimed was "statistically impossible". Trump later said that Pete Hegseth was "doing a great job", describing the political scandal and ensuing controversy as a "witch hunt" against Hegseth and added that Waltz has taken responsibility for it. The Atlantic reported that Trump is privately upset with the recklessness of his advisers but has focused on attacking the press and journalists in public. Trump administration When The Atlantic published its report on March 24, 2025, National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes issued a statement confirming the message chain was authentic and indicating that they were "reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain". Hughes characterized the thread as demonstration of "deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials" and said there had been "no threats to troops or national security" resulting from the incident. On March 26, Karoline Leavitt said that Elon Musk had volunteered his "technical experts" to help the White House investigate how Goldberg was added to the chat. Regarding the incident, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said no classified information was shared. According to anonymous sources within the administration, the incident caused internal concern, with multiple administration officials expressing shock at the security breach. Other officials said that Signal was widely used throughout the administration for communications, leading to internal discussions about implementing new guidance or rules for internal communications. There were no immediate indications that Trump planned to dismiss any officials over the matter. Vance's communications director William Martin issued a statement: "Vice President Vance unequivocally supports this administration's foreign policy" and that "The President and the Vice President have had subsequent conversations about this matter and are in complete agreement." Photos on social media of Waltz and Goldberg standing next to each other during a 2021 event at the French Embassy circulated after Waltz's claim. Goldberg said of the photos, "If your eyeballs see us together, then I guess your eyeballs are seeing us together". Trump later commented, "I don't think he should apologize. I think he's doing his best." Trump claimed a Waltz staffer had included Goldberg, which was later contradicted by Waltz on national television. Waltz has also suggested that Goldberg added himself to the Signal chat or that a technical mishap that led to the breach, claims that were later described by Goldberg as "crazy". Goldberg claims that he received a message request from Waltz on March 11, which he accepted. Goldberg also said in an interview, "If I'm such a nefarious character, why am I in Mike Waltz's phone? Why does he have my phone number? Why is he including me in this chat? And what do you expect a reporter to do when you learn interesting information about the way an administration is contemplating military action? What do they really think is going to happen?". He also said on CNN, "I will guarantee you, 99.99 percent with confidence, Russia and China are monitoring those two phones, so I just think it's a security violation, and there's no doubt that Russia and China saw this stuff within hours of the actual attacks on Yemen or the Houthis." Bacon further called the group chat a "gross error" and said, "They intentionally put highly classified information on an unclassified device, I would have lost my security clearance in the Air Force for this and for a lot less." Following the April 20 reporting of an additional Signal chat, Bacon suggested "I wouldn't tolerate it if I was in charge" and that Hegseth is "acting like he's above the law—and that shows an amateur person". Politico reported this as Bacon calling for Hegseth's firing. Senate Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) characterized the incident as "one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence" in recent history during a floor speech on March 24. Schumer urged his Republican colleagues to collaborate in a congressional hearing into the security breach, describing the situation as extraordinarily serious and requiring immediate attention. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) stated that he would investigate the matter in detail. Senator Mark Kelly (D-Arizona), in an interview with NPR, called for Pete Hegseth's resignation, stating that he is "unqualified for this job;" and "if he doesn't resign, the president should fire him." Other political figures Former CIA Director and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta commented that "somebody needs to get fired" and highlighted that if someone other than Goldberg had received the information, they "could reveal this information immediately to the Houthis in Yemen that they were about to be attacked". Pete Buttigieg, a former Naval Intelligence officer who served as Transportation Secretary during the Biden administration, characterized the incident from "an operational security perspective" as "the highest level of fuckup imaginable" and concluded that "[t]hese people cannot keep America safe". Alex Wagner, a former assistant Air Force secretary for manpower and reserve affairs, wrote that "if any Airman or Guardian or civilian employee were discovered to have shared top-secret information on their personal devices, it would be the end of their career and likely would result in a court-martial or criminal referral to the Justice Department. To fail to hold, say, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth accountable would be to undermine the military's crucial dedication to operational security and to send the corrosive message that leaders are held to a lower standard than their troops". US military personnel A dozen Air Force and Navy fighter pilots told The New York Times that they were concerned with the leaders' poor operational security and inability to admit their errors. International European representatives reacted negatively to the leaked group chat, with various anonymous officials voicing concern for the "reckless" leaks and badmouthing of European nations as "freeloaders". European officials nonetheless assured the public that their diplomatic relations with the United States remained stable and that the lives of their people were not at risk. Canadian prime minister Mark Carney, in the context of his country's deteriorating relations with the United States, warned that the leaks meant that Canada has to start looking out more for itself in defense capabilities. Israeli officials were reported to be "furious" with the leak because it included sensitive intelligence Israel provided to the United States. == See also ==