Pentagon chief says 'nobody was texting war plans’ after group chat breach

WASHINGTON

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday that "nobody was texting war plans" after a report indicated that a journalist was inadvertently added to a sensitive messaging group.

"Nobody was texting war plans, and that's all I have to say about that," Hegseth told reporters in Hawaii.

His remarks came after Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor in chief of the Atlantic magazine, disclosed in an article published hours prior that he had been mistakenly added to a group of senior officials on the Signal messaging platform on March 13 after receiving a connection request from National Security Advisor Mike Waltz two days prior to relay plans for military strikes against Yemen’s Houthi group.

Hegseth called Goldberg a "deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who's made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again"

“This is a guy who peddles in garbage," he added.

Earlier, National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes said the leaked messages are apparently "authentic."

Goldberg said that alongside him in the group were accounts that appeared to represent some senior Trump administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Hegseth, and National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard.

President Donald Trump said he was unaware of the incident when asked about the report.

"I don't know anything about it. You're telling me about it for the first time. I'm not a fan of the Atlantic," he said.

'That's a lie'

Goldberg pushed back on Hegseth’s remarks, saying: "That's a lie."

"He was texting war plans. He was texting attack plans," Goldberg told CNN.

"When targets were going to targeted. How they were going to be targeted. Who was at the targets. When the next sequence of attacks were happening," he said.

The journalist said he didn’t publish it "because it felt like it was too confidential."

Goldberg said that 18 people were in that chat, and he removed himself when he was sure that the chat was "real."

Democrats call for full investigation of 'national security breach'

Democratic lawmakers blasted the incident, saying it was a breach of US national security, and called for a full investigation.

"This is one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence I have read about in a very, very long time," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told the Senate floor.

It's "bad enough" that a private citizen was added to this chain, he said.

"It's far worse that sensitive military information was exchanged on an unauthorized app," he added.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said this is "reckless, irresponsible and dangerous."

"There should absolutely be a congressional investigation so that we can understand what happened, why did it happen, and how do we prevent this type of national security breach from ever happening again," Jeffries said.

Meanwhile, House Speaker Mike Johnson ruled out any potential disciplinary action for Waltz and Hegseth.

"Clearly, I think the administration has acknowledged it was a mistake and they’ll tighten up and make sure it doesn’t happen again," Johnson told reporters.