Trump administration officials continued to defend themselves Wednesday against claims that they mishandled classified information following the public release of a Signal group chat used to plan military strikes in Yemen.
Speaking at a House Intelligence Committee hearing on worldwide threats, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard called the incident, in which a journalist was accidentally added to the chat, a “mistake.”
“It was a mistake that a reporter was inadvertently added to a Signal chat with high-level national security principals having a policy discussion about imminent strikes against the Houthis and the effects of the strike,” Gabbard said. “National security adviser [Mike Waltz] has taken full responsibility for this, and the National Security Council is conducting an in-depth review, along with technical experts, working to determine how this reporter was inadvertently added to this chat.”
However, Gabbard and other officials insisted that no classified information was shared. A report published Wednesday in The Atlantic revealed details of the chat, including attack plans that included specifics on timing and types of military assets used, following the outlet’s bombshell report Monday that Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg had been privy to a highly sensitive discussion among senior Trump administration officials.
“I used an appropriate channel to communicate sensitive information. It was permissible to do so,” said CIA Director John Ratcliffe. “I didn’t transfer any classified information. And at the end of the day, what is most important is that the mission was a remarkable success.”
Gabbard added that government officials have been encouraged to use encrypted apps like Signal for communication when in-person meetings are not possible, and said Signal is “pre-installed” on government devices. She pointed to December guidance from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency directing “highly targeted individuals” to use only end-to-end encrypted communications.
“At times, fast-moving coordination of an unclassified nature is necessary where in-person, conversation is not an option,” she said.
However, a separate 2023 Defense Department memo warned against the use of “unmanaged” messaging apps, such as Signal, to transmit nonpublic information.
Democrats on the committee railed against the officials involved in the incident, who include Gabbard, Ratcliffe, Waltz, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Everyone here knows that the Russians or the Chinese could have gotten all of that information, and they could have passed it on to the Houthis, who easily could have repositioned weapons and altered their plans to knock down planes or sink ships,” said Connecticut Democrat Jim Himes, ranking member of the panel. “I think that it’s by the awesome grace of God that we are not mourning dead pilots right now.”
Republicans on the committee largely sidestepped the issue, instead focusing their questions on other topics. Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., asked a series of friendly questions that allowed Gabbard to confirm that no targets, locations, routes, methods, or unit names were discussed in the chat.
“Wouldn’t an operational plan contain that type of information?” he asked.
“Every operational plan I’ve ever seen has contained that information,” Gabbard responded.
Hegseth and Waltz both took a similar stance on Wednesday, suggesting the information discussed in the group chat was too vague to qualify as war plans that should be classified.
“So, let’s me get this straight. The Atlantic released the so-called ‘war plans’ and those ‘plans’ include: No names. No targets. No locations. No units. No routes. No sources. No methods. And no classified information,” Hegseth wrote on the social platform X Wednesday. “Those are some really shitty war plans.”
But Democrats vociferously pushed back against that idea, with more than one lawmaker displaying printed-out versions of the leaked Signal chat.
“The idea that this information, if it was presented to our committee, would not be classified, we all know, is a lie,” said Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas. “That’s ridiculous. I’ve seen things much less sensitive be presented to us with high classification, and to say that it isn’t is a lie to the country.”
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