By now, you've likely ingested a fair amount of information, spin, and counter-spin on the national security controversy surrounding a text chain among top Trump administration officials. My general sense is that this was a reckless, sloppy breach that should never have happened. It has also turned into something of a Rorschach test for partisans on both sides. For the most part, the people screaming loudest about this incident are people who downplayed or excused various episodes in which senior Democrats mishandled classified information – from Hillary Clinton to Joe Biden. And those downplaying or excusing this fact pattern would be screaming loudest if the other "side" were responsible for it. A few thoughts:
(1) One argument, currently popular among many on the left, is that this puts the final nail in the "But Her Emails" coffin. Wrong. Hillary Clinton set up a secret, non-permitted, grossly-insecure personal email server in her closet, on which she trafficked in extremely highly sensitive materials. She lied about it brazenly. And her team tried to permanently destroy incriminating evidence. She committed crimes and should have been charged. So, yes, but her emails. That was a disgraceful episode, as were Joe Biden's foolish and unlawful choices about classified items in his possession. I have also been very critical of Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago documents firestorm, which entailed breathtakingly irresponsible conduct, including evidence of obstruction. My overall attitude is that we either need to enforce our laws protecting state secrets evenly and consistently, or we need to downgrade or get rid of them. In this realm, we do seem to have a two-tiered system of justice – one for the elite politicians and the other for the rest of our vast national security apparatus. There shouldn't be special, unwritten loopholes based on political power or importance. Also, if you're going to argue that Clinton and Biden's behavior was disqualifying, you should work extra hard to play everything precisely by the book on this front. Team Trump and Republicans campaigned on being better. They should be better.
(2) Lashing out at The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg – a media figure seen as largely hostile to the Trump administration and whose credibility has been heavily questioned by many conservatives on various topics – doesn't really work here. A spokesman for the White House's National Security Council admitted that Goldberg really was inadvertently looped into a text chain on which exceptionally secret and sensitive military operations were openly discussed:
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Oh for God's sake, the administration has already confirmed the authenticity of the message. https://t.co/AxQGqqyux3
— Brit Hume (@brithume) March 24, 2025
“Brian Hughes, the spokesperson for the National Security Council, confirmed the message chain was authentic…. ‘This appears to be an authentic message chain, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain…’” https://t.co/AAcH4bQZuA
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) March 24, 2025
If anything, Goldberg acted reasonably and deliberately, holding onto his shocking scoop until after that barrage of anti-Houthi attacks was complete and withholding some contents of the chats that could endanger our interests. Goldberg, widely reviled in Trump world, was brought into this conversation by a mistake. It was a big mistake. Again, one of the campaign attack lines against Biden was that he never held anyone accountable for anything, including after outrageous debacles like the Afghanistan withdrawal, and when his Secretary of Defense misled the chain of command and disappeared for a spell, for health reasons. Will there be accountability here? And if so, for whom? For what it's worth, it appears to be established that the National Security Adviser was the official who accidentally looped in Goldberg, quite possibly mistaking him for another person with the initials JG in his contacts. We'll see what, if anything, happens here.
(3) Is it a scandal, or even illegal, that basically every high-ranking person in the Trump administration was interacting on these subjects via Signal (an open source end-to-end encrypted messaging app)? At first blush, it would seem so, but I've heard arguments that this app was used on government-encrypted devices. If that's the case, this would look less problematic, even if these actions were a far cry from best practices. I'll keep my powder dry on this question because there are details I'm not sure about. What I do feel confident saying is that American taxpayers spend a fortune on top secret communications systems for government officials in positions of power and public trust. This was acknowledged in some of the Signal text messages we've seen in this leak. When it comes to the nature, method, and timing of military attacks against terrorist enemies, those officials should be fanatical about adhering to proper protocols and channels. And yes, Congresswoman, these were attacks on terrorist enemies:
They’re bombing terrorists, Rashida https://t.co/piDHojmeWr
— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) March 25, 2025
(4) I don't really disagree with Will Cain's observation here, though I am glad the Vice President's apparent policy stance didn't prevail in this instance:
This is how you would hope…if not in the means, the manner…American leaders to talk.
— Will Cain (@willcain) March 24, 2025
That was one of my reactions, too, but I wouldn't call it a top takeaway. Regardless, we should not be in any position to offer such commentaries because we shouldn't be seeing any of this. Arguments that Goldberg made the whole thing up (initial spin from some) or that he was deliberately included in the chat strike me as cope. I'll leave you with a notable quotable that appears to broadly capture the situation (language warning):
“Well, somebody fucked up,” Sen. Tim Sheehy, R-Mont., tells reporters. https://t.co/Kl4s1mt9sI
— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) March 24, 2025
Editor's Note: The radical left-wing media is doing everything it can to blow this story out of proportion and certainly can't be trusted to report the facts.
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