WASHINGTON − The Atlantic magazine published Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s messages to a group chat detailing the times and weapons used to strike Houthi targets in Yemen, as the fallout deepened over Trump administration officials using the encrypted chat app Signal to discuss classified war plans.
In a new article published Wednesday morning, Jeffrey Goldberg, the magazine’s editor-in-chief, posted pictures of messages Hegseth sent the chat – which included President Donald Trump’s highest-level national security officials – listing the planned launch times of F-18s and Tomahawks. Goldberg discovered the chat in mid-March when Mike Waltz, Trump’s top national security advisor, accidentally added him.
The White House acknowledged that Goldberg was accidentally added to the chat. In a Tuesday Fox News interview, Waltz took “full responsibility” for letting in Goldberg, promising to “get to the bottom of it.” During her briefing with reporters on Wednesday, Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the Signal chat involving top national security officials and Goldberg contained no classified information.
The Trump administration’s use of Signal, a messaging app publicly available on the app store, for sharing its war plans ignited mounting concerns over the national security breach.
On Capitol Hill, the topic dominated a previously scheduled House Intelligence Committee hearing featuring testimony from CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and FBI Director Kash Patel. Democrats continued to call for Trump to fire Hegseth, while Nebraska GOP Rep. Don Bacon told reporters the Trump administration is “in denial” on the issue.
More: Timeline, transcripts of secret war plan Signal chat Trump admin shared with editor
Trump questions whether Signal is defective
Trump questioned the quality of Signal amid criticism over his national security team sharing plans for attacking Houthis with a reporter over the app.
“I don’t know that Signal works,” Trump said. “It could be a defective platform and we’re going to have to find that out.”
But he said the results of the attacks on the Houthis have gone well.
“The result is unbelievable,” Trump said. “The Houthis want peace because they’re getting the hell knocked out of them. It’s been very, very strong. The Houthis are dying for peace.”
Trump said National Security Adviser Mike Waltz took responsibility for sharing the chat with Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg.
“There was no harm done because the attack was unbelievably successful that night,” Trump said.
Asked whether Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth should resign, Trump said expressed confidence in him. House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., called on Trump to fire Hegseth Tuesday.
“Hegseth is going a great job,” Trump said. “He had nothing to do with it.”
Hegseth shared details about the aircraft and flight times of the attack in the chat.
−Bart Jansen
Rubio calls allowing reporter on Signal chat ‘a big mistake’ and expects ‘reforms’
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters Wednesday that the information on the Signal chat shared with a reporter about a Houthis strike was a “mistake” and that he expected the White House to make “reforms” to prevent it from happening again.
“I’ve been assured by the Pentagon and everyone involved that none of the information that was on there, though not intended to be divulged, obviously, that was a mistake and shouldn’t have happened and the White House is looking at it,” said Rubio, who was in Kingston, Jamaica. “Obviously, it was a big mistake.”
“But none of the information that was on there at any point threatened the operation or the lives of our servicemen,” Rubio added. “In fact, it was a very successful operation, and it’s an ongoing operation.”
The Pentagon said the information wasn’t classified and there was no intelligence in the messages, Rubio said.
“This was sort of a description of what we could inform our counterparts around the world when the time came to do so,” Rubio said.
The White House is investigating how the journalist became a part of the group.
“I think there will be reforms and changes made so this is not going to happen again,” Rubio said. “It can’t.”
– Bart Jansen
Hegseth says ‘nobody’s texting war plans’
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth continued to push back against characterizations that the information he texted other Trump administration officials in a Signal chat earlier this month was classified war plans.
“Nobody’s texting war plans,” he told reporters Wednesday afternoon before boarding a plane in Hawaii. “As a matter of fact, they even changed the title to attack plans, because they know it’s not war plans,” he said. Earlier that morning, the Atlantic published an article that included screenshots of Hegseth’s messages detailing weapons that would be used to strike Houthi targets in Yemen, and what times the strikes were planned.
“There’s no units, no locations, no routes, no flight paths, no sources, no methods, no classified information,” he added.
Results of Houthis operation speak for themselves: White House
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt insisted again on Wednesday that the Signal chat involving top national security officials and a reporter contained no classified information.
“There was no classified information transmitted,” Leavitt told reporters. “There were no war plans discussed.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks during the daily briefing in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, DC, on March 26, 2025.
The information included launch times for F-18 flights and descriptions of targets. But Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Wednesday that no classified information or war plans were shared, despite what the “hoax peddlers” at Atlantic magazine said.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe both testified under oath this week that no classified information was discussed, Leavitt said.
Leavitt added that the American people should decide whether the operation was harmed by the chat after reviewing that no U.S. troops were injured while terrorists were killed and their weapons were destroyed.
“I would classify this messaging thread as a policy discussion – a sensitive policy discussion, surely – amongst high-level Cabinet officials and senior staff,” Leavitt said. “The results of this operation should speak for themselves.”
– Bart Jansen
Trump remains confident in national security team: spokesperson
President Donald Trump is still confident in this national security team and won’t be firing any of the officials involved in the Signal chat with a reporter that described attack plans against the Houthis, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Wednesday.
“The president’s view on all of this remains the same today as it did yesterday,” Leavitt said. “He has placed great trust in his national security team.”
U.S. National Security Advisor Mike Waltz gestures on the day U.S. President Donald Trump meets with U.S. ambassadors at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 25, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
As for the usage of Signal, Leavitt said it was an approved app for the Defense Department, State Department and CIA.
“It is the most secure way to communicate,” Leavitt said.
– Bart Jansen
NSC, Musk will investigate how reporter got on Signal chat
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Wednesday that the National Security Council, the White House counsel’s office and billionaire adviser Elon Musk’s team will investigate how National Security Adviser Mike Waltz inadvertently included a reporter on a chat about the Houthis strikes.
“Elon Musk has offered to put his technical experts on this, to figure out how this number was inadvertently added to the chat, again to take responsibility and make sure that this can never happen again,” Leavitt said.
– Bart Jansen
CIA director and House Democrat have testy back and forth over Hegseth’s drinking
Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Calif., asked CIA Director John Ratcliffe whether Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was drinking before he “leaked classified information” about a strike on Houthis in Yemen.
Ratcliffe responded: “I think that’s an offensive line of questioning. The answer is no.”
U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) points to text messages by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC.
As Hegseth’s nomination as Defense secretary was being considered by the U.S. Senate earlier this year, multiple people raised concerns that he had problematic drinking habits and that he drank on the job. Hegseth denied he has a drinking problem and pledged to quit drinking if he was confirmed.
Ratcliffe and Gomez then spoke over each other as the Democratic lawmaker sought to reclaim his time and ask a new question while Ratcliffe sought to explain further.
“This was a question that was on the top of minds of every American,” Gomez argued. “Of course we want to know if his performance is compromised.”
– Riley Beggin
Swing district Republican says White House ‘in denial’ over Signal chat
Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., who represents a House district that Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris won in the 2024 presidential election, told reporters Wednesday that the Trump administration is “in denial” about The Atlantic’s reporting showing top administration officials sharing sensitive information via a Signal chat that included a journalist.
Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) speaking to the media before he enters a GOP conference meeting on Friday, October 20, 2023.
“The White House is in denial that this was not classified or sensitive data,” Bacon said. “They should just own up to it and preserve credibility.”
The White House and top officials in the chat have denied that classified information was shared.
– Riley Beggin
NSA Director confirms vulnerability to Signal messaging app
The senior Trump administration officials’ use of Signal to discuss U.S. military attack plans in Yemen continued to come under scrutiny during Wednesday’s House Intelligence Committee hearing.
Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo., pressed the National Security Agency’s director, Timothy Haugh, on a recent cybersecurity warning to NSA employees revolving around Signal “because there’s risk to that app.”
“There are,” Haugh said.
People gather at the site of U.S. strikes in Sanaa, Yemen March 20, 2025.
The administration’s Russia negotiator, Steve Witkoff, was in Russia while he was in the chat, and Crow asked whether he was on his personal phone. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard replied, “I don’t know.”
Gabbard was in the Asia-Pacific when she received the text messages through Signal, she said. But Gabbard said she didn’t remember which country she was in.
Crow said effective leaders “accept responsibility when things go wrong… you set the standard from the top.”
“It is completely outrageous to me that administration officials come before us today with impunity. No acceptance of responsibility. Excuse after excuse after excuse,” Crow said.
– Riley Beggin
Top Democrat on Intel Committee presses Gabbard on Signal chat testimony
The House Intelligence Committee is holding a hearing on Wednesday with top U.S. intelligence officials, including National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe. Both were members of the Signal chat where sensitive information about a Houthi strike in Yemen was shared.
Ranking Member Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., noted that during a Senate hearing on Tuesday both Gabbard and Ratcliffe were asked whether the Signal chat included information on weapons, packages, targets or timing in the Yemen strike.
Vice Chairman Rep. Trent Kelly (R-MI) questions witnesses during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. The hearing held by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence addressed top aides inadvertently including Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen.
Himes asked Gabbard whether she would like to reflect on that answer, given the messages showing those details were in a story published by The Atlantic on Wednesday morning.
More: But her e-mails? Here is how Trump’s team reacted to a Hillary Clinton security breach
“My answer yesterday were based on my recollection or the lack thereof on the details that were posted there,” Gabbard said.
Himes also raised the office’s guidance for classification that indicates information providing advance warning that the U.S. or its allies are preparing an attack “should be classified as top secret.”
Gabbard said “I don’t disagree with that,” but added that the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, has the authority to classify or declassify information.
– Riley Beggin
NSA director says Signal chat information ‘would be classified’ if intercepted
U.S. Air Force General and Director of the National Security Agency (NSA) Timothy Haugh attends a House Intelligence Committee hearing about worldwide threats, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 26, 2025.
National Security Agency Director Timothy Haugh testified during Wednesday’s House Intelligence Committee hearing that he’d consider the information at the center of the leaked Signal chat “classified” had it been intercepted from Russia or China.
“It would be classified” based on our collection methods, Haugh said in response to a question from Rep. Julian Castro, D-Texas.
– Riley Beggin
Gabbard calls Signal chat leak a ‘mistake’
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday that it was a “mistake” for a journalist to be added to the Signal chat where officials shared intelligence information about a U.S. military strike on the Houthis in Yemen.
The National Security Council is conducting “an in-depth review” of how The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, was added to the chat, but “there were no sources, methods, locations or war plans that were shared,” she said, despite screenshots of the messages The Atlantic published Wednesday morning.
More: Who is Jeffrey Goldberg? Editor accidentally gained access to Pete Hegseth’s war plans
The Signal messaging app “comes pre-installed on government devices,” Gabbard added, and administration officials were encouraged to use it to communicate, though in-person conversations are ideal.
Gabbard said she is now “limited in (her) ability” to comment on the case because of a lawsuit that has since been filed against the administration over the mishap.
– Riley Beggin
Senate Democrat says Signal leak ‘a crime in my view’
The details released by Hegseth in the Signal group texts were clearly classified and “is a crime in my view,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and a member of the Armed Services Committee, said Wednesday in an interview.
“This is information at the very top of the pyramid as to what should be kept secret and classified,” Blumenthal told USA TODAY. “He should resign. There is no question that he has betrayed his trust.”
Pilots who have flown missions to attack Houthi targets have described to Blumenthal “sophisticated, effective air defenses that put them in jeopardy without advanced word they are coming. The idea that he revealed times, the weapon systems and target is a crime in my view.”
It’s baffling, Blumenthal said, that Hegseth wouldn’t have used secure communications because he has an aide at his side to provide them.
“To disclose this information on Signal on what we are using to strike targets and when shows incompetence,” Blumenthal said. “It’s unconscionable.”
– Tom Vanden Brook
Judge targeted by Trump for impeachment assigned to Signal chat lawsuit
U.S. District Chief Judge James Boasberg, a D.C. federal judge whom President Donald Trump has said should be impeached, was assigned to handle a new lawsuit dealing with Trump administration officials’ use of a Signal chat to discuss planned military strikes in Yemen.
The March 18 Trump post on Truth Social for Boasberg and other judges to face impeachment garnered a rare public rebuke from Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, who said appealing decisions rather than impeaching judges was the right way to deal with losing in court.
Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe (L) testifies during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. The hearing held by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence addressed top aides inadvertently including Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen.
Trump was angry because Boasberg issued a temporary restraining order to halt deportations under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, a law that Trump is trying to invoke to get around the typical legal process for deportations.
Boasberg is now assigned to hear a lawsuit brought by American Oversight, a nonprofit government watchdog alleging Trump officials’ didn’t comply with the Federal Records Act when it came to preserving records tied the Signal chat communications, which the Atlantic’s editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg saw when he was included – seemingly by mistake – in the chat.
Some messages in the chat were set to disappear after one week and some after four weeks, according to Goldberg’s firsthand account.
– Aysha Bagchi
House Intelligence Committee hearing opens with warnings from top Republican and Democrat
(L-R) National Security Agency Director General Timothy Haugh, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Kash Patel, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Jeffrey Kruse prepare to testify during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. The hearing held by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence addressed top aides inadvertently including Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen.
Two of the officials that were included in the Signal chat – Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe – are testifying Wednesday before the House Intelligence Committee for its annual threats hearing.
Committee Chairman Rick Crawford, R-Ark., opened the hearing with top intelligence officials by acknowledging that the Signal messaging scandal dominated the Senate’s analogous hearing on Tuesday. He said he hoped Wednesday’s hearing would focus more on the national security threats facing the U.S. government.
“I have deep concerns about the state of our national security,” he said.
Ranking Member Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., the top Democrat on the committee, slammed the Trump administration’s approach to foreign policy and national security, but made it clear that he would be asking about the Signal chat.
More: Democrats grill Trump officials over potential leak of classified materials
“After these last two months, I’m worried the call might be coming from inside the house,” he said. “As far as I can tell, we’re on team Kremlin.”
Now we know that people “in the most dangerous and sensitive jobs on the planet” put sensitive information into a Signal chat that could be intercepted by the Russians and the Chinese, he said.
“I think it’s by the awesome grace of God that we are not mourning dead pilots right now,” Himes said.
⁃ Riley Beggin
Atlantic releases attack plans discussed by Trump officials in Signal chat
The Atlantic magazine on Wednesday released the full text chain from Hegseth and other top Trump officials detailing operations to carry out U.S. military airstrikes in a Signal chat group with a reporter present after the White House denied “war plans” had been shared.
The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief revealed in a new report what Hegseth told the “Houthi PC Small Group” on March 15 before the U.S. conducted airstrikes on Iran-backed Houthi sites and during the operation.
More: Atlantic reveals US attack plans discussed by Trump officials in Signal group chat
The report includes screen shots of the group texts, which detail drone targets, sequencing of the attacks and the type of weaponry used.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks to members of the media, as images are displayed of U.S. President Donald Trump receiving information on military strikes launched against Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis, in the briefing room at the White House, in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 17, 2025.
Goldberg and fellow Atlantic reporter Shane Harris said The Atlantic had previously withheld publicizing Hegseth’s texts out of concern for the sensitive nature of the information. Goldberg had been mistakenly invited to the chat and was observing the group’s conversations, unbeknownst to the 18 Trump officials in the chat.
But after Trump officials insisted Tuesday that no classified material was shared in the chat ‒ and downplayed the gravity of the breach ‒ the magazine’s journalists said they decided to disclose the messages to let people “reach their own concussions.”
Trump’s White House on Tuesday continued to dispute the initial Atlantic report about “war plans” being discussed in the chat, noting that The Atlantic’s headline describes the information as “attack plans,” not war plans like Monday’s initial story.
“The Atlantic has conceded: these were NOT ‘war plans,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. “This entire story was another hoax written by a Trump-hater who is well-known for his sensationalist spin.”
– Joey Garrison
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump admin on defensive as leak fallout spreads: Signal live updates
