Trump officials blast journalist after Signal leak published in full

The White House has expressed strong dissatisfaction with *The Atlantic* magazine's full publication of messages from a Signal group chat involving national security officials. President Trump called the report a "complete and total political witch hunt" and claimed the magazine was a "failing magazine."

Jeffrey Goldberg was the journalist inadvertently added to the group chat consisting of senior cabinet members. He shared sensitive information provided in the group chat by then-Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, including detailed timelines and troop information prior to U.S. military operations in Yemen. Goldberg stated he decided to release the information after the Trump administration accused him of lying about sharing classified information.

Despite officials sticking to their previous positions, some senior officials, including Trump himself, began to acknowledge it was a mistake. When reporters asked who should be held responsible for allowing a journalist to view the Signal communications, Trump suggested it was his National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz. "I think Mike Waltz claimed responsibility for it," Trump said at a press conference in the Oval Office. "I was told it was Mike." He added that Waltz "took responsibility."

Trump defended his Secretary of Defense Hegseth, who posted details of the upcoming military operation in the group chat. "Hegseth did a good job," Trump said. "This has nothing to do with him." Trump also said the Signal leak "doesn't bother me," but added that the app was "not good." He also called Mr. Goldberg a "total lowlife."

In an interview with the BBC, Goldberg said the Trump administration was trying to shift blame to the journalist instead of "actually acknowledging that they had a massive national security breach and they should go fix it." Secretary of State Marco Rubio, also a participant in the group chat, admitted during a visit to Jamaica on Wednesday that "obviously, someone made a mistake... a big mistake, and added a reporter."

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, also a participant in the group chat, told the House Intelligence Committee that the National Security Council would conduct a "thorough review" to determine how the reporter was added. She also acknowledged it was a mistake, even as she insisted that no classified information was shared. President Trump described the matter as "not a big deal," while National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who set up the group chat, said Tuesday night that he took "full responsibility" for it.

Meanwhile, Democrats have called for Hegseth to resign, saying the information he inadvertently shared with the reporter could endanger the lives of American service members if it fell into the hands of U.S. adversaries. Earlier this week, Goldberg published an initial article recounting how he discovered he had been added to the chat group on the encrypted messaging app Signal, shocking Washington. At the time, he said he withheld details of some of the information he saw because it contained classified information about U.S. intelligence operatives and military strikes against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

While the White House quickly acknowledged that the exchanges were real, senior officials, including Hegseth, sought to discredit the magazine's editors. Goldberg said in a new article published on Wednesday that he decided to publish the discussion of the Yemen strike plans so that Americans could "draw their own conclusions." Goldberg and co-author Sean Harris wrote on Wednesday: "Disclosing the information that Trump advisers included on a non-secure communications channel is obviously in the public interest, especially at a time when senior government officials are trying to downplay the importance of the shared information."

At a White House press briefing, Press Secretary Caroline Leavitt directly attacked Goldberg, accusing him of being an "anti-Trump hater" and a "propagandist in the media" pushing a "Signal hoax." "The real story here is the tremendous success of the decisive military action against the Houthi terrorists," Leavitt continued.

The information published in full by *The Atlantic* included details of the U.S. military's "plan package" for the Yemen strike—a military term for a group of aircraft or weapon systems that will participate in an operation. Other information concerned damage assessments conducted after the strike, as well as CIA operations in Yemen and anticipated Israeli strikes against the Houthis. Hegseth continued to defend himself on Wednesday. "They knew it wasn't a war plan," he told reporters in Hawaii. "There were no units, no locations, no routes, no flight routes, no sources, no methods, no classified information." Hegseth added that his job was to "provide updates in real time." "That's what I did," he added.

But several military experts and intelligence community veterans said the information was highly sensitive and should never have been shared on a commercial messaging app. "A war plan is generally the plan to conduct the entire conflict," Mick Mulroy, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Middle East Affairs and retired CIA paramilitary officer, told the BBC. "Strike plans derive from that and go all the way down to the unit level." He added: "Both are classified and highly sensitive. In fact, one could argue that strike plans are more sensitive because they are more detailed and specific in time, place and manner."