The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg claims national security leaders accidentally included him in a group chat in which the Trump administration’s war plans were being discussed.
The journalist published a piece on Monday saying that he knew that the United States would be launching an attack on the Houthis in Yemen on March 15 because he received a message from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth outlining “precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing.”
Goldberg explained how he ended up in a group chat with high-profile national security leaders. He received a connection request on Signal, an encrypted messaging app, from national security advisor Michael Waltz.
I accepted the connection request, hoping that this was the actual national security adviser, and that he wanted to chat about Ukraine, or Iran, or some other important matter.
Two days later—Thursday—at 4:28 p.m., I received a notice that I was to be included in a Signal chat group. It was called the “Houthi PC small group.”
A message to the group, from “Michael Waltz,” read as follows: “Team – establishing a principles [sic] group for coordination on Houthis, particularly for over the next 72 hours. My deputy Alex Wong is pulling together a tiger team at deputies/agency Chief of Staff level following up from the meeting in the Sit Room this morning for action items and will be sending that out later this evening.”
The message continued, “Pls provide the best staff POC from your team for us to coordinate with over the next couple days and over the weekend. Thx.”
As Goldberg explains, “The term principals committee generally refers to a group of the senior-most national-security officials, including the secretaries of defense, state, and the treasury, as well as the director of the CIA.”
The group chat on Signal included 18 different officials representing federal agencies such as the Department of State, the Department of Homeland Security, and several others. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President JD Vance were also in the chat, according to Goldberg.
The journalist was suspicious at first, believing this to be a ploy to entrap him. Or, perhaps, it was a foreign government operation aimed at spreading disinformation.
After receiving the Waltz text related to the “Houthi PC small group,” I consulted a number of colleagues. We discussed the possibility that these texts were part of a disinformation campaign, initiated by either a foreign intelligence service or, more likely, a media-gadfly organization, the sort of group that attempts to place journalists in embarrassing positions, and sometimes succeeds. I had very strong doubts that this text group was real, because I could not believe that the national-security leadership of the United States would communicate on Signal about imminent war plans. I also could not believe that the national security adviser to the president would be so reckless as to include the editor in chief of The Atlantic in such discussions with senior U.S. officials, up to and including the vice president.
The discussions focused on the impending strike on the Houthis. Vance expressed doubts about the timing of the military strike, Goldberg explained. He suggested postponing the attack for a month to hone the Trump administration’s messaging on the matter. The vice president allegedly pointed out that only three percent of U.S. trade “runs through” the Suez Canal, while 40 percent of European trade travels through the area.
Others in the group still wanted to push forward. Hegseth allegedly told Vance that he supports raising the issue with Trump but stated that he believed “messaging is going to be tough no matter what – nobody knows who the Houthis are – which is why we would need to stay focused on: 1) Biden failed & 2) Iran funded.”
The Hegseth message goes on to state, “Waiting a few weeks or a month does not fundamentally change the calculus. 2 immediate risks on waiting: 1) this leaks, and we look indecisive; 2) Israel takes an action first – or Gaza cease fire falls apart – and we don’t get to start this on our own terms. We can manage both. We are prepared to execute, and if I had final go or no go vote, I believe we should. This [is] not about the Houthis. I see it as two things: 1) Restoring Freedom of Navigation, a core national interest; and 2) Reestablish deterrence, which Biden cratered. But, we can easily pause. And if we do, I will do all we can to enforce 100% OPSEC”—operations security. “I welcome other thoughts.”
Vance responded, " If you think we should do it, let’s go. I just hate bailing Europe out again,” according to Goldberg.
Hegseth came back, noting that he shares Vance’s “loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC,” but affirmed that “we are the only ones on the planet (on our side of the ledger) who can do this.”
Goldberg’s article includes screenshots of the alleged messages between the officials.
The journalist then explains that the chat was used to coordinate the strike. He chose not to quote from these messages because they could compromise the military.
According to the lengthy Hegseth text, the first detonations in Yemen would be felt two hours hence, at 1:45 p.m. eastern time. So I waited in my car in a supermarket parking lot. If this Signal chat was real, I reasoned, Houthi targets would soon be bombed. At about 1:55, I checked X and searched Yemen. Explosions were then being heard across Sanaa, the capital city.
After the news broke about the attack, Goldberg left the chat. “No one in the chat had seemed to notice that I was there. And I received no subsequent questions about why I left—or, more to the point, who I was,” he wrote.
He followed up with some of the officials in the chat, asking whether it was an authentic conversation and whether he was included accidentally or deliberately. A spokesman responded, saying it appeared to be “an authentic message chain.”
The spokesman continued, characterizing the threat as “a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials.”
Goldberg suggested that this breach could possibly constitute violations of the Espionage Act. Moreover, since the messages were set to self-delete after a week, which raises questions “about whether the officials may have violated federal records law: Text messages about official acts are considered records that should be preserved.”
If Goldberg is telling the truth, then the individual who included him in the chat made a massive mistake. We can expect legacy media outlets to blow this up as much as possible.
I’m not sure as to whether Goldberg’s assertions about the legalities of this incident are accurate. But it seems clear that this was an accident. Moreover, it does not appear that it resulted in any real harm. Yes, it does raise concerns about how this information was treated, but it could have been far worse.
