President Donald Trump’s claim that he was unaware of a cabinet-level breach of classified information—an incident reportedly involving up to 18 top national security officials discussing sensitive details of a planned military strike—appears to have backfired, raising questions about his knowledge of the actions of his top officials, and, as Commander-in-Chief, his knowledge of U.S. national security and military operations.
The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, revealed Monday afternoon that he inadvertently had been included in the 18-person group chat on the unclassified messaging app Signal. Experts say those discussions should never have been held over the app, but rather inside a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or inside multiple SCIFs.
On Monday afternoon at a press conference, a reporter asked the commander-in-chief for his reaction to the story in The Atlantic.
“I don’t know anything about it,” was Trump’s immediate response. His next response was to attack the media outlet.
“I’m not a big fan of The Atlantic, it’s, to me it’s a magazine that’s going out of business,” the president declared. “I think it’s not much of a magazine, but I know nothing about it.”
He then asked the reporter to explain to him what had been reported in The Atlantic.
“You’re saying that they had what?” “Having to do with what?” he asked twice. “What were they talking about?”
After the reporter gave him more information, Trump, seemingly still not understanding all the details, declared that the leak “couldn’t have been very effective because the attack was very effective, I can tell you that.”
He again denied any knowledge of the leak.
“I don’t know anything about it,” Trump repeated. “You, you’re telling me about it for the first time.”
The White House has acknowledged the leak occurred. Axios called it a “mind-boggling security breach.” The Washington Post reported that “the disclosure raises questions about how the administration has discussed classified issues and whether anyone will be disciplined.”
“As the bombing campaign moved ahead, Hegseth’s [Signal] account shared details that Goldberg said he believed could put at risk the safety of U.S. troops or intelligence officials, especially those deployed in the Middle East,” the Post reported. “Those details, the Atlantic article says, allegedly included the specific weapons to be used and in which sequence the Houthi targets would be hit.”
Military and national security experts are stunned — not only that this massive leak occurred, but that the President was not informed until a reporter asked him about it on Monday.
“If the President is telling the truth and no one’s briefed him about this yet, that’s another story in itself. In any other administration, CoS would have been in the Oval within nanoseconds of learning about something like this, wroteThe Atlantic’s Tom Nichols via social media, referring to the White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. Nichols is a retired U.S. Naval War College professor who is an expert on national security, international affairs, Russia, and nuclear weapons.
“Heads need to roll for this. They have broken laws and endangered the lives of our service members with this idiocy,” commented Army veteran of 22 years, Fred Wellman, a graduate of West Point and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Journalist Wajahat Ali wrote, “What’s worse is that he HAS no idea, allegedly, about the story, which makes it even worse and more terrifying. Like, bro, why don’t you know?”
“One wild thing about Trump,” observed journalist Isaac Saul, “is that he is notoriously insulated from certain information streams by his team. Absolutely believable that he went out to the podium having not been informed of this massive story bc the people who brief him on info were culpable in the leaks.”
“Here’s some insight,” offered Sophia Kinzinger, a former press secretary for the Department of Homeland Security. “The White House has an entire department, staffed by military professionals, dedicated to facilitating secure communications. They travel with staff, provide devices, and set up SCIFs (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities) whenever and wherever needed, operating 24/7. There is absolutely no excuse for mishandling classified information, especially for someone leading the National Security Council at the White House. Their actions clearly demonstrate a lack of qualification for such a critical role. we deserve better!”
Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX) added: “If it’s true that the President of the United States had no idea that his war cabinet and VP were discussing war plans on a Signal chat that included a journalist, that is astounding ignorance and profound incompetence.”
Derek Martin, who conducted supply chain counterintelligence at the National Security Agency (NSA), asked: “If Trump doesn’t know about a major incident involving his VP, Chief of Staff, NatSec Advisor, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Director of National Intelligence, and CIA Director, then who exactly is running the government?”
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), according toDeadline, wrote: “Every single one of the government officials on this text chain have now committed a crime – even if accidentally – that would normally involve a jail sentence. We can’t trust anyone in this dangerous administration to keep Americans safe.”
In his report at The Atlantic, Goldberg noted that “coordinating a national-security-related action over Signal, may have violated several provisions of the Espionage Act, which governs the handling of ‘national defense’ information, according to several national-security lawyers interviewed by my colleague Shane Harris for this story.”
Goldberg also explained that he chose to not publish all of the texts, noting that, “if [some] had been read by an adversary of the United States, [they] could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel, particularly in the broader Middle East, Central Command’s area of responsibility. What I will say, in order to illustrate the shocking recklessness of this Signal conversation, is that the Hegseth post contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.”
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Reprinted with permission from Alternet
