Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth allegedly shared sensitive intelligence about impending military operations in Yemen with his wife, brother, advisers, and personal lawyer, in addition to sharing similar details around the same time in the widely reported-on Signal group chat that featured a reporter unbeknownst to the other participants.
President Donald Trump continues to support him, and both have claimed that the report, which Hegseth has not directly denied, came from “disgruntled former employees” who were fired last week, the secretary said.
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What was this new group chat about and who was in it?
Members of this group chat, which was named “Defense | Team Huddle,” include his wife, Jennifer, his brother, Phil, who serves as a Department of Defense-Department of Homeland Security liaison, his personal lawyer, Tim Palatore, and some of his senior advisers. It’s unclear why they would have access to such sensitive information.
Hegseth created this chat himself, and it was started prior to his confirmation.
Two of the advisers who were purportedly in the group chat were fired last week in connection to an investigation into media leaks. Senior adviser Dan Caldwell and deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick, both of whom were in the chat, were among a trio of officials who were fired and they all collectively denied the allegations.
Hegseth reportedly shared similar information, including the flight schedules for the F/A-18 Hornets involved in the mission, in both chats.
Jennifer Hegseth’s participation in two separate meetings with Hegseth’s foreign counterparts has also raised eyebrows. She attended a March 6 meeting with Hegseth and his U.K. defense counterpart and she attended a NATO meeting in Brussels in February.
“There was no classified information in any Signal chat,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said on Sunday night. It’s unknown if he shared these details in any other group chats.
What happened in the aftermath of Signal Gate 1?
The U.S. military began an aggressive military campaign on March 15 against the Houthis in Yemen, an Iranian-backed group, which has disrupted global shipping for about 18 months in response to the Israel–Hamas war.
The Atlantic reported days later that its editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, was unintentionally included in a group chat on Signal, featuring more than a dozen Cabinet officials, in which they discussed whether the U.S. should begin a sustained military campaign against the Houthis.
Hegseth maintained in the aftermath of the scandal that he did not share classified “war plans” in the chat, but he did disclose details on the timing of U.S. strikes and what weapons systems would be used in the attacks.
Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz created the group chat on March 11, and he asked everyone to provide a good point of contact for each cabinet official so they could coordinate future communications. Hegseth responded with Caldwell.
The group proceeded to debate the merits of launching a sustained military operation in the group chat. He later provided updates in the Signal chat to the other senior officials, which appear to be a real-time play-by-play, specifically relaying details about times, concepts of operations, and weapons systems that would be included.
The Department of Defense Office of the Inspector General launched an investigation into Hegseth’s use of Signal earlier this month in response to a request from the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the Secretary of Defense and other DOD personnel complied with DOD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business,” Steven Stebbins, the acting DOD inspector general, said in a memo dated April 3 to Hegseth and Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg.
The inspector general’s office declined to comment on Monday, citing long-standing policy not to publicly discuss ongoing evaluations.
Who are the ‘disgruntled former employees’?
A Pentagon spokesman told the Washington Examiner last week that Caldwell was placed on leave for an “unauthorized disclosure,” and was later fired. Both Selnick and Colin Carroll, chief of staff to the deputy secretary of defense, were put on leave as a part of the same investigation.
They released a joint statement over the weekend, which read in part, “We still have not been told what exactly we were investigated for, if there is still an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation of ‘leaks’ to begin with.”
Selnick served in the first Trump administration Selnick in roles at the Department of Veterans Affairs and at the White House on the Domestic Policy Council. Both he, Caldwell, and Hegseth previously worked for the Koch-backed veterans advocacy group, Concerned Veterans for America.
Another former Pentagon official, John Ullyot, who also left his position last week, defended the group saying in an op-ed published in Politico that “not one of them has been given a lie detector test,” and added, “Hegseth’s team has developed a habit of spreading flat-out, easily debunked falsehoods anonymously about their colleagues on their way out the door.”
Ullyot was the interim chief Pentagon spokesman prior to Parnell’s appointment and during Trump’s first term, he held positions leading communications at the National Security Council and the Department of Veterans Affairs.
He was also one of the lead officials defending the Pentagon’s purge of diversity and inclusion initiatives throughout the services. The process was mired in controversies, as their use of “[artificial intelligence] tools and other software” had “incorrectly” flagged some material to be taken down, including a story about Jackie Robinson, the professional baseball player who broke the color barrier in 1947, Parnell said. Robinson served in the Army during World War II prior to making his Major League Baseball debut.
The secretary claimed the fired staffers were responsible for leaking the story.
“What a big surprise that a few leakers get fired and suddenly a bunch of hit pieces come out,” he said on Monday morning at the White House’s Easter egg roll. “This is what the media does. They take anonymous sources from disgruntled former employees and then they try to slash and burn people and ruin their reputations. Not going to work with me.”
Days before the Atlantic reported that Goldberg was inadvertently added the Signal group chat, Hegseth’s chief of staff, Joe Kasper, wrote a memo to the undersecretary of defense for intelligence and security announcing an “immediate and thorough investigation” into “recent unauthorized disclosures of national security information involving sensitive communications with principals within the Office of the Secretary of Defense.”
The leaks that prompted this memo predate the first report of the Signal scandal. It was sent the same day the department and the White House denied reports that Elon Musk would receive a briefing on war plans in the event of a war with China during a trip to the Pentagon.
“The use of polygraphs in the execution of this investigation will be in accordance with applicable law and policy,” he added.
Kasper is also reportedly set to leave his role as Hegseth’s chief of staff, adding to the upheaval in the secretary’s inner circle, though he may remain in the department.
Does Hegseth still have Trump’s confidence?
Trump continues to back Hegseth, like he did Waltz in the aftermath of the initial reporting on the Signal group chat.
“He is doing a great job. Ask the Houthis how he’s doing,” the president said on Monday during the Easter egg roll. “Just fake news brings up stories. Sounds like disgruntled employees. He was put there to get rid of a lot of bad people, and that is what he is doing.”
White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt also denied an NPR report that the White House “has begun the process of looking for a new secretary of defense,” calling the story “total FAKE NEWS.”
Hegseth, prior to his confirmation, did not have support from Democrats in Congress, who characterized him as unfit for office due to his lack of relevant experience. Several of them called for his resignation in the aftermath of the initial Signal scandal.
What are Senior Republicans saying?
Many senior Republicans who have long shown their support for Hegseth have not yet publicly commented on the new details, but one who has is Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR).
Cotton, who is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and an Army veteran himself, said, “Never a clearer case of liberal media publishing sour grapes from a disgruntled former employee,” in reference to Ullyot’s op-ed.
Another committee member, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), said he stands with the secretary.
“I will lead the breach,” Mullin stated. “I will lay down cover fire. I will take the high ground. I’ll expose myself to enemy fire to communicate. We must bring back integrity, focus, and put the Warfighter first inside DOD.”
Sen. Roger Wicker, the chairman of the committee, has not yet commented, but he and the top Democrat, Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), asked the inspector general to investigate the scandal.
A day after their request, Wicker said on social media, “The Beltway press will try to make it seem otherwise, but it bears remembering: [Hegseth] and I are working in lockstep to deliver on President Trump’s promise to restore peace through strength. We have a strong partnership, and that will continue.”
Donald Trump Jr. said of Ullyot specifically in the wake of the Politico op-ed, “This guy is not America First. I’ve been hearing for years that he works his a** off to subvert my father’s agenda. That ends today. He’s officially exiled from our movement.”
Who is calling on Hegseth to go?
Several Senate Democrats who didn’t support Hegseth’s nomination have called on him to resign or get fired in the wake of the new information.
The list of those seeking his resignation or dismissal includes Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), as well as a handful of members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, including Sens. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Elissa Slotkin (D-MI).
HEGSETH POSTED YEMEN STRIKE DETAILS IN SECOND SIGNAL CHAT
One Republican has called on Trump to fire Hegseth so far, Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), a member of the House Armed Services Committee.
“If it’s true that he had another [Signal] chat with his family, about the missions against the Houthis, it’s totally unacceptable,” he told Politico. “I’m not in the White House, and I’m not going to tell the White House how to manage this … but I find it unacceptable, and I wouldn’t tolerate it if I was in charge.”