The scandal exploded on Monday when Jeffrey Goldberg, editor -in -chief of The Atlantic, published an article in which he tells how he witnessed for four days of a conversation of senior national security officials who coordinated the plans to launch air attacks against the hutis rebels in Yemen.
Goldberg was added to the group chat, in the application of Messenger Encrypted Signal, on January 11. He was invited to join the so -called “small group of Hutí PC” on an account that had the name of the White House Security Advisor, Mike Waltz. There were 18 participants in total, including key users such as the Vice President, JD Vance, the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, the State, Marco Rubio, and the National Intelligence Director, Tulsi Gabbard.
Although the journalist doubted for several days of the authenticity of the chat, on March 15, while sitting in his car in the parking lot of a supermarket, the attack in Yemen that had been detailing in the chat finally happened. With this he confirmed that everything was real.
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“Until almost the last minute I could not believe that this was really happening (…) I could not believe that the leadership in national security of the USA was communicated through signal on imminent war plans,” Goldberg told Radio Atlantic.
In his article, the journalist recounts the content of the conversations, obviating the information he considers delicate for national security. He states that Hegseth revealed a detailed plan on the objectives and characteristics of the operation hours before it happened. In addition, he witnessed the doubts of Vice President JD Vance about the realization of the attack.
The pressure grows
The White House confirmed that the message chain is authentic, but minimized its impact. “They were not discussed ‘War Plans'” and “No classified information was sent,” said spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt in X, who explained that the government “tries to understand” how the Goldberg number was accidentally added.
Trump said Tuesday 25 that it is “the only failure in two months, and turned out not to be serious.” He reiterated his support for Waltz and said that the White House Security Advisor “learned the lesson and is a good man.”
He added that Waltz has nothing to apologize and “probably” refrains “in an immediate future” to use Signal again.
Although the National Security Council declared that the chat seemed to be authentic, Waltz said that “there are many journalists in this city that have become famous inventing lies.”
The pressure grew after the scandal was treated at an intelligence audience in Congress that was already scheduled. Democratic senators criticized the management of sensitive information in the Chat of Signal, qualifying it as reckless and dangerous, so they requested the resignation of Hegseth and Waltz.
The two main espionage chiefs, the director of the CIA, John Ratcliffe, and the director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, emphasized that the information exchanged in the Chat of Signal was not classified, but recognized the sensitivity of the information about the objectives of the attack.
The leader of the Democratic minority in the House of Representatives, Hakeem Jeffries, strongly criticized Hegseth for discussing sensitive details of a military attack in the group chat in which a journalist was.
Most legislators of the Republican party preferred not to criticize the government, but some suggested that they could investigate how the filtration had occurred.
Filtration has paid attention to the qualities of high controls linked to intelligence and defense. The Hegesh nomination, a former Fox News presenter, to direct the Pentagon was approved by the Senate by a narrow margin, amid questions about his little experience and accusations of sexual aggression and abuse of alcohol consumption.
“The United States allies must be extremely concerned, because there were already fears for the fragile confidence in the intelligence structures given who were the people nominated and confirmed by Congress. Now this is giving the reason to those who opposed that these people were in those positions. That is what the experts of the intelligence field have said. They have warned that this filtration is extremely serious and that some head has to roller,” To El Comercio the political scientist María Puerta Riera, a professor of American Government at Valencia College in Orlando.
The revelations of the content of the conversations have also focused on Washington’s attitude towards Europe. In the group chat in Signal Vice President JD Vance expressed doubts about carrying out the attacks in Yemen because he hated “rescue Europe again”, considering that huti attacks against ships affected the countries of that continent more than to the United States.
Puerta points out that the attitude and disdain of Vance to the old continent has been clear. “It has been proven that the hard hand posture that the vice president has towards Europe is not a staging, but is a real conviction”
Possible federal crimes
The management of sensitive data in Signal opens the possibility that Trump administration officials present in the group Chat have incurred federal crimes, even if, as the White House says, the information sent was not classified.
The newspaper “The New York Times” points out that the 1917 espionage law stipulates that the national defense information does not have to be classified to be harmful to the country’s security.
“The courts have ruled that such information must be protected if it is related to national security, such as military or intelligence matters. However, the Department of Justice rarely processs the infractions that are not classified,” explains the medium.
Goldberg rejected Tuesday the Trump administration claims that the details shared in the chat did not include classified information.
Despite the serious filtration, door is unlikely that important corrective measures will be taken. “In a normal world, in a different government to this, first that this would not have happened, but if it had been the case, the dismissal or resignation of those involved and the immediate beginning of a process in the Department of Justice would have been immediately meant. However, we see that this will not happen. Because the president has said it is very likely that nothing happens and there is no guarantee that this will be remedied,” he says.
The filtration also focused on Signal, whose use is not approved by the Government. In addition, it is an application in which the messages disappear over time, something problematic because according to the norms there must be a record of the sensitive conversations and discussions of the government.
The American Oversight Surveillance Group filed a lawsuit before the Federal District Court of Washington requesting a court order to preserve all messages in the controversial group chat of Signal.