The editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, published a story Monday, March 24, that claimed he had been inadvertently added to a messaging group of core Trump administration officials. He explained that the “principals committee” revealed details of a forthcoming attack on Houthi rebels (that took place on March 15) and that the security breach could have been potentially devastating.
Naturally, the Fourth Estate took this as a sign that President Trump’s administration was in chaos and duly began crafting a narrative to that effect. But what are the details, and does the excoriation of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth hold water?
Signals on Signal
The messages were reportedly sent on Signal, a privacy-focused messaging app that uses end-to-end encryption. Goldberg writes that he was added to a group on the platform by National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and began receiving messages from a team that included Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, among many other high-profile names.
While much of the discussions centered on policy – and here, he posts screenshots – Goldberg hints that some messages included highly sensitive national security matters related to upcoming plans for military action against the Houthi. Goldberg writes:
“I will not quote from this update, or from certain other subsequent texts. The information contained in them, if they had been read by an adversary of the United States, could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel, particularly in the broader Middle East, Central Command’s area of responsibility.
“What I will say, in order to illustrate the shocking recklessness of this Signal conversation, is that the Hegseth post contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.”
If what The Atlantic head writes is an accurate interpretation, it certainly represents a damning failure of security protocols. The fact that he was added to the group at all implies that someone was extremely careless, at the very least. Secretary Hegseth, however, has a different story.
Hegseth on the Defense?
“Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that,” Hegseth told reporters shortly after the story broke. But he did have more to say. He continued, referring directly to Goldberg:
“You’re talking about a deceitful and highly discredited, so-called journalist who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again, to include the, I don’t know, the hoaxes of Russia, Russia, Russia, or the fine people on both sides, hoax, or suckers and losers hoax.
“This is the guy that pedals in garbage. This is what he does.”
And, indeed, Goldberg does have a track record of unverified stories – what many describe as hoaxes. He was the journalist who first wrote that Trump had called fallen soldiers “suckers” and “losers,” despite no evidence existing that such a statement was ever made. Even John Bolton, who was with Trump on the overseas trip when the statement was allegedly made – and who is no fan of Trump’s – declared that Trump simply never made such a remark.
However, it seems that the two key issues remain: that administration officials are using Signal and that an outsider was added to the group.
Protocols
The government has protocols for how sensitive information is to be discussed or transmitted, almost all dependent upon the level of classification. Highly sensitive data should ordinarily only be addressed in person, ideally in Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities or SCIFs. Or, if this is not practical, on what the Defense Department refers to as “managed” systems – Signal is not considered a managed system.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) commented, “This is one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence that I have read about in a very, very long time,” and called for an investigation. Majority Leader John Thune responded, “We’re just finding out about it. But obviously, we’ve got to run it to ground and figure out what went on there. We’ll have a plan.”
Some responses were more hyperbolic.
Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) posted on X, “Every single one of the government officials on this text chain have now committed a crime – even if accidentally – that would normally involve a jail sentence.” This sentiment was echoed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who wrote that using Signal was “blatantly illegal and dangerous beyond belief.”
While the use of messaging platforms certainly demands attention, one must wonder just how much of the outrage is political theater.
Playing the Hillary Card
Washington, DC’s, most prominent newspaper was quick to jump to the Hillary Clinton server debacle and declare that this was “the final nail in the ‘but her emails’ coffin.” The opinion piece went on to explain that while Clinton did, indeed, use a non-government server, it was not for the purpose of discussing national security concerns. However, missing from the 1,600-word piece, were a few key details.
The first, and most important is that the writer decided to make an assumption that favors Clinton. He could not know whether the then-secretary of state appointed by Barack Obama was discussing sensitive topics via the unauthorized server because more than a dozen devices of hers were either destroyed with a hammer or wiped using BleachBit. The wiping was described by then South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy as cleaned to the extent that “even God couldn’t read them.”
Sens. Warren and Coons, who apparently want heads to roll today, were not so vociferous when it came to the woman they tried to make president back in 2016. And in fact, this is the same position that much of the Fourth Estate is currently taking.
There will be political fallout for Trump officials using Signal rather than an approved messaging system. But because Democrats ignored Clinton’s flagrantly reckless methods of communication, they have lost the moral high ground. In the realm of public opinion, that may be the more important issue as any investigation will almost certainly lead to a relitigation of a story Democrats had hoped was finished along with Hillary Clinton’s political ambitions.
