Hegseth accidentally texted war plans to The Atlantic's editor-in-chief

[Nevilledog]

Last edited Mon Mar 24, 2025, 01:56 PM - Edit history (2)

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/03/trump-administration-accidentally-texted-me-its-war-plans/682151/

No paywall link
https://www.smry.ai/proxy?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fpolitics%2Farchive%2F2025%2F03%2Ftrump-administration-accidentally-texted-me-its-war-plans%2F682151%2F

The world found out shortly before 2 p.m. eastern time on March 15 that the United States was bombing Houthi targets across Yemen.

I, however, knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing.

This is going to require some explaining.

The story technically begins shortly after the Hamas invasion of southern Israel, in October 2023. The Houthis—an Iran-backed terrorist organization whose motto is “God is great, death to America, death to Israel, curse on the Jews, victory to Islam”—soon launched attacks on Israel and on international shipping, creating havoc for global trade. Throughout 2024, the Biden administration was ineffective in countering these Houthi attacks; the incoming Trump administration promised a tougher response.

This is where Pete Hegseth and I come in.

On Tuesday, March 11, I received a connection request on Signal from a user identified as Michael Waltz. Signal is an open-source encrypted messaging service popular with journalists and others who seek more privacy than other text-messaging services are capable of delivering. I assumed that the Michael Waltz in question was President Donald Trump’s national security adviser. I did not assume, however, that the request was from the actual Michael Waltz. I have met him in the past, and though I didn’t find it particularly strange that he might be reaching out to me, I did think it somewhat unusual, given the Trump administration’s contentious relationship with journalists—and Trump’s periodic fixation on me specifically. It immediately crossed my mind that someone could be masquerading as Waltz in order to somehow entrap me. It is not at all uncommon these days for nefarious actors to try to induce journalists to share information that could be used against them.

*snip*


JFC

[Nevilledog]

1. Kick....this is a BFD

[Trueblue1968]

39. He must have been drunk as a skunk !!!!!!

[ShazzieB]

48. Did you read my mind?

Those exact words were going through my mind as soon as I saw the OP!

"I'm Pete Hegseth, and..."

[PatSeg]

49. That was my first thought,

though people who drink a lot tend to be awfully foggy even when they're sober. What a freaking nightmare.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

68. Hegseth had to be drunk

[unc70]

2. The whole article is a disturbing read

This seems a part of a big deal concerning secrecy and national security.

[Nevilledog]

3. Absolutely

[Zorro]

100. They were practicing GOPSEC

You know, the exact opposite of OPSEC.

[Nevilledog]

4. Kick for title change

[highplainsdem]

12. Btw, that should be The Atlantic's _editor_.

[Nevilledog]

24. Yeah..I did it fast.

[bluesbassman]

5. JFC! Was Hegseth drunk when he did that, or just plain stupid.

Of course two things can be true at the same time.

[allegorical oracle]

19. Well, what should we expect from a Faux Noose weekend TV host?

[dchill]

26. I wonder if it's provable that he's even been sober while in office.

[Reader Rabbit]

36. Those possibilities aren't mutually exclusive.- n/t

[aggiesal]

47. I'm betting on both. n/t

[customerserviceguy]

66. I think we have to consider the possibility

that this "mistake" was deliberate. Trump is all about show and bluster, and a juicy "leak" would certainly help the media outlet that got it become a tool for him.

[bluesbassman]

69. Good point.

Certainly tracks with his modus operandi.

[prodigitalson]

84. Yes and yes

He is always stupid and reportedly always drunk

[obamanut2012]

6. They are using SIGNAL to discuss this

My God.

Butter emails.

[Bluethroughu]

7. Hogsbreath is drunk again, but dumb forever.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

8. Here is a free link to the article in the OP-This is a major breach of national security

This is a major breach of security. If a Democratic administration had released this type of national security information, there would be calls for impeachment

Link to tweet

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/03/trump-administration-accidentally-texted-me-its-war-plans/682151/?gift=Cgqh0-mGExsQQ_xEA88IsFBTXcgGKcOJRI1x7WcTigU&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

I have never seen a breach quite like this. It is not uncommon for national-security officials to communicate on Signal. But the app is used primarily for meeting planning and other logistical matters—not for detailed and highly confidential discussions of a pending military action. And, of course, I’ve never heard of an instance in which a journalist has been invited to such a discussion.

Conceivably, Waltz, by 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. Harris asked them to consider a hypothetical scenario in which a senior U.S. official creates a Signal thread for the express purpose of sharing information with Cabinet officials about an active military operation. He did not show them the actual Signal messages or tell them specifically what had occurred.

All of these lawyers said that a U.S. official should not establish a Signal thread in the first place. Information about an active operation would presumably fit the law’s definition of “national defense” information. The Signal app is not approved by the government for sharing classified information. The government has its own systems for that purpose. If officials want to discuss military activity, they should go into a specially designed space known as a sensitive compartmented information facility, or SCIF—most Cabinet-level national-security officials have one installed in their home—or communicate only on approved government equipment, the lawyers said. Normally, cellphones are not permitted inside a SCIF, which suggests that as these officials were sharing information about an active military operation, they could have been moving around in public. Had they lost their phones, or had they been stolen, the potential risk to national security would have been severe.....

Waltz and the other Cabinet-level officials were already potentially violating government policy and the law simply by texting one another about the operation. But when Waltz added a journalist—presumably by mistake—to his principals committee, he created new security and legal issues. Now the group was transmitting information to someone not authorized to receive it. That is the classic definition of a leak, even if it was unintentional, and even if the recipient of the leak did not actually believe it was a leak until Yemen came under American attack.

All along, members of the Signal group were aware of the need for secrecy and operations security. In his text detailing aspects of the forthcoming attack on Houthi targets, Hegseth wrote to the group—which, at the time, included me—“We are currently clean on OPSEC.”

[Solly Mack]

9. Damn.

[raccoon]

10. Good thing this MF wasn't around when we were fighting Adolf.

[malaise]

11. This is the KKKK

That is all

[Jim__]

13. This is one reason you don't put a completely unqualified person in a critical role.

We need someone qualified to be Secretary of Defense.

[live love laugh]

17. This is why they DO put these kind in place--to sow chaos and breed fear.

[NJCher]

75. nobody even questioned it

Goldberg remarked on that a couple times.

This level of security is more casual that a union executive board's!! I'm on one and we are constantly monitoring for people who are trying to learn of our plans. We don't start the meeting until every person is accounted for. If we don't know them, they don't get on.

It has happened a few times over the year that someone who was not supposed to be there tried to "sit in."

We often have reports from the treasurer. Wouldn't the college and univerity administration people just love to know how much we have in our treasury? It would mean knowing how long we could go out on strike.

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. "should have mailed it to the Marx Brothers" (nt)

[Brother Buzz]

38. "You can't fool me. There ain't no sanity clause!"

[Auggie]

50. LOL

Dr. Jones to Dr. Jones

[mcar]

15. Heads should roll - but they'll find a woman

or Black person to blame.

[NJCher]

76. Vance was already setting up

Biden to blame if it didn't go well. One other, too, can't recall.

[Dennis Donovan]

16. Rep Pat Ryan: If House Republicans won't hold a hearing on how this happened IMMEDIATELY, I'll do it my damn self.

Pat Ryan
‪@pkryan.bsky.social‬

Only one word for this: FUBAR.

If House Republicans won’t hold a hearing on how this happened IMMEDIATELY, I’ll do it my damn self.

March 24, 2025 at 1:11 PM

Only one word for this: FUBAR.

If House Republicans won’t hold a hearing on how this happened IMMEDIATELY, I’ll do it my damn self.

— Pat Ryan (@pkryan.bsky.social) 2025-03-24T17:11:19.201Z

[travelingthrulife]

18. Whiskey Pete strikes again!

[Figarosmom]

20. Yeah

He never stopped drinking.

[DinahMoeHum]

21. Sooner or later, Hogsbreath is gonna fuck up BIG TIME

and we may lose an aircraft carrier or battle group, with thousands killed or injured.

[neohippie]

22. I didn't see this posted

I created another LBN story because I didn't see this one posted

I apologize but this is definitely a big story... "But her emails"

[LudwigPastorius]

23. Hegseth accidentally texted war plans to The Atlantic reporter

[bamagal62]

27. Is he drunk enough yet?

Geez.

[Hornedfrog2000]

28. Ordinarily this would end ones career.

Buuuuut with the rightwing media empire in this country, they will default to whatever trumps says to say happened.

[live love laugh]

29. Ooops ....

Accidentally my ass.

[Norbert]

30. If they mentions Hillary's emails one more time

There will be hell to pay. This is serious.

[democrank]

31. Hegseth' s qualifications for this job

could be written (with a black Sharpie) on a pea.

[elleng]

32. Pete Hegseth Sent Secret War Plans to Journalist by Accident: Report

Published Mar 24, 2025 at 1:55 PM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-secret-houthi-war-plans-goldberg-hegseth-2049762

[jmowreader]

33. I don't think this was "accidental"

It appears to me that they're setting up a pretext to arrest Jeffrey Goldberg for illegal possession of national security information. They'll also get him for illegal dissemination of national security information because he published it on The Atlantic's website.

There's a very important - and also very illegal - reason they're using Signal rather than government-owned communication channels to do this shit: government-owned communication channels route traffic to the National Archives and Records Administration for permanent storage, and Trump wants to leave as little record of his evildoing as possible. We remember during the last Trump Administration his staff blew the budget on Scotch tape to put documents Trump tore up back together.

[Justice matters.]

41. THIS

EVERYTHING THEY (THE Fascists) DO is nefarious.

[misanthrope]

67. From what I read in the article

It sounded as if Goldberg was highly aware of dirty tricks throughout the episode and mindful in his deliberation. He took care to notify most of the parties involved long before publishing it and dutifully removed the most sensitive information to which he was privy.

[JohnnyRingo]

96. However, their first reaction was damage control.

Hegseth going on air to call Goldberg a widely discredited so called reporter and a liar.
So the official explanation, at least at that time, is that it never even happened. Can't charge anyone for leaking or possessing secret info if it's a journalistic hoax.

Besids, Pete was drunk and doesn't remember.

[AdamGG]

99. I think Project 2025 specifically mentions

communicating on private apps and avoiding government communication channels for this reason. It's a documented strategy and they've probably done it multiple other times - they just got caught this time.

I don't see how they can prosecute Goldberg for having information from a meeting that they invited him to. Also, they're testifying absurdly before Congress that they didn't discuss anything confidential, so that should make it impossible to bust Goldberg for it.

[Nictuku]

34. Wow!

[SheltieLover]

35. He needs to be removed, but I'm sure tsf is pleased because his boss

Will love this story.

[NJCher]

78. next time maybe

putin will be on the list--he'll be a VP.

[SheltieLover]

79. I wouldn't be at all surprised if he was in the list

[D. Spaulding]

37. This is incompetence on a major scale

And the administration is basically saying the reporting from Goldberg is correct.

[Old Crank]

40. Incompetence reigns supreme

And this is deadly incompetence. Who else got the text?

[Demovictory9]

42. Hearings should be held!!! Thats what would happen if hapoened under Biden

[aggiesal]

43. S.N.A.F.U. ...

If you don't know the actual words from this acronym, I suggest you look it up;

[struggle4progress]

44. Hegseth the Booze-Breathed Halfwit

[Bev54]

45. Wow, I wish I could say I was surprised

But everyone of these people are totally incompetent and unsuitable for the job at hand. Incredible read and hats off to Goldberg for having such integrity.

[UTUSN]

46. "accidental" or incompetence/negligence - & KRASNOV oblivious - resignation or firing all around

If the shoe were on the other foot the wingnuts would be screaming for both heads - but it ain't gonna happen.

[IronLionZion]

51. DEI did this

Butter emails

[no_hypocrisy]

52. Big mistake. Meant for Putin.

[blueseas]

53. Kick

[LuvLoogie]

54. They totally tried to set him up.

Somebody wants Hegseth's job. Imagine a cabinet where nobody is trustworthy to any edict, cause, or person, let alone to the United States.

[mikelewis]

55. Wow... now that is a STORY!!!

Imagine that! It's rare for reporters to be a part of the story but man was that a great read.

Looks like more pardons are coming!

[Starfury]

56. Hope no one is naive enough to think this was a one-off

Beyond the sheer stupidity and incompetence...

This is how our government is being run, via Signal text chains. This is routine. Everything is off-book. No records are kept or maintained. Everything is deleted. Everything is free-wheeling.

And no controls on who's included in those chains. "But her emails..."

[Fiddlelady11]

57. Read

The whole article! It’s pretty damning!! Incompetent oafs!

[NBachers]

58. "Boy is my face red! I actually meant to send it to Vladimir Putin." Pete Kegsbreath

[Norrrm]

59. Would a sober SECDEF do this?

[DFW]

60. The Secret Service has anglicized his code name

He is now known as Jack Daniels.

[mtngirl47]

61. This is absurd. But even more ridiculous is the fact that cabinet members

are communicating with emojis.

For crying out loud.

[republianmushroom]

62. Was The Atlantic's editor-in-chief name on the same list as Putin's ?

[ReRe]

63. OMG

This country is in dire danger. Everyone in that Administration are idiots!
Seriously, can we as a people survive 4 years of this ignorance?

[Skittles]

88. can you even imagine what our fighter pilots are thinking

wondering who all knows the plans

[allegorical oracle]

64. This whole crew from Waltz to Hegseth and on down, behave as if they're

coaching a Little League baseball team, not protecting the USA. Emojis are sprinkled through the messaging -- like it's cool jock talk coming from middle-aged paunch-bellies.

[kerouac2]

65. This is just the one we know about. Are there others?

Who else may have been texted secret info? We only know because this person told us. Others may not be so open about what they have been sent...

[LetMyPeopleVote]

70. Hillary Clinton gets the last laugh

Link to tweet

[C_U_L8R]

71. And they conspired to blame it on Biden. It just gets worse and worse.

This toilet bowl of imbeciles need to resign en masse.

[TBF]

72. Must be drinking again. nt

[LetMyPeopleVote]

73. MaddowBlog-Team Trump accidentally shared war plans with a journalist, sparking scandal

Americans’ safety is in the hands of unqualified amateurs, who clumsily invited The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief to join a chat about a military strike.

Americans' safety is in the hands of unqualified and inexperienced amateurs, who write as if they're over-caffeinated middle-schoolers playing video games, and who clumsily invited a journalist to join an unsecured chat about a foreign military operation. www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-03-24T20:02:32.125Z

Americans' safety is in the hands of unqualified and inexperienced amateurs, who write as if they're over-caffeinated middle-schoolers playing video games, and who clumsily invited a journalist to join an unsecured chat about a foreign military operation.

Link to tweet

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/team-trump-accidentally-shared-war-plans-journalist-sparking-scandal-rcna197863

But to fully appreciate the truly galactic nature of Team Trump’s competence problem, one must read — and then re-read — the latest report from Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief.

The world found out shortly before 2 p.m. eastern time on March 15 that the United States was bombing Houthi targets across Yemen. I, however, knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing.

In a story so ridiculous that it almost defies description, much of the Trump administration’s national security team — Vice President JD Vance, Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and White House national security adviser Michael Waltz — organized a meeting to discuss plans for a military strike.

That might not sound especially notable, but these powerful officials didn’t meet to discuss an active military operation in a sensitive compartmented information facility, or SCIF, where phones are not permitted. Rather, they help their chat by way of a Signal thread — and they inadvertently invited a journalist to participate......

Do these guys always write as if they’re over-caffeinated middle schoolers playing video games? (Kevin Kruse, a historian at Princeton University, wrote in response to the reporting, “In private, these people seem immensely stupid.”) Do they remember what they said about Hillary Clinton, who was accused of using a private platform to discuss sensitive national security matter?

But as the political world comes to terms with the scope and scale of this genuine scandal, I’m stuck on the fact that the White House’s breathtaking incompetence appears to be undermining the national security of the United States in terrifying ways. Americans’ safety is in the hands of unqualified and inexperienced amateurs, who clumsily invited a journalist to join a chat about a military strike in a foreign country.

For his part, a reporter asked Donald Trump for his reaction to the revelations, just hours after The Atlantic published its report online. “I don’t know anything about it,” the president said. After taking a few rhetorical shots at the magazine, he again added: “I know nothing about it.”

That doesn’t make matters any better, given that he really ought to know something about it.

[Wild blueberry]

74. FUBAR

It's worse than we can imagine.

[MiKenMi33]

77. War plans are classified!

The unauthorized release is a crime. Lock him up!

[ecstatic]

80. That's what happens with DUI hires

trump's entire cabinet is dangerously unqualified, but hegseth takes the cake. An unqualified drunk who was fired from his previous gigs and settled sexual abuse lawsuits. A dream come true for America's enemies.

But hey, at least he's a white guy!

Magats can sleep better at night knowing good ol' pete is there to handle those 3am calls (assuming he's not in the middle of drinking or raping someone).

[pat_k]

81. Adding Goldberg isn't the worst part.

The worst part is that this is proof that this lawless administration is being run "off book" in a commercial app that automatically deletes all records.

Anyone with access to any participants' phone would be privy to classified plans.

Insanity!!

If Biden officials were caught using signal for top secret discussions and decision-making and had included a Fox News host, can you imagine the response?

The true outrage is that we won't be seeing such a response from the 47 enablers in the media. And unless they are hammered and forced to act by their constituents, the Republican Congress will continue to abdicate their duty to defend the constitution.

[ShazamIam]

82. Has anyone heard the national news folks call for Hegseth's immediate resignation? nt

[tanyev]

83. "The thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials."

Right, they were careful to use deep and thoughtful emojis.

[Ping Tung]

85. Imagine that some body named Pfc Jake Smith accidentally leaked classified info to a reporter.

The court martial would already be over and Jake would be serving 300 years in a military prison.

[Skittles]

90. try to imagine if it was a woman, or POC

yes INDEED

[hunter]

86. The dopes thought they were playing a game of rope-a-dope.

They lost because Jeffrey Goldberg is not a dope. Goldberg behaved as a responsible journalist, citizen, and adult, which is something beyond this crew's comprehension.

[alarimer]

87. My imposter syndrome has been cured

There is nothing I could ever do at work that would be worse than this.

So thanks, Pete.

I'll just tell my boss, whenever I mess up, "at least I haven't given away top secret war plans."

[Quixote1818]

89. Fist bumping emoji's as over 30 children were being blown up. Stunning immaturity! Nt

[kimbutgar]

91. What's disgusting is that nothing will happen and it will be forgotten by the end of the week

Fox and the other corporate media will not report on it and it be glory holed into history!
I’m sure Russia and China have already seen the messages and have access to all our major intelligence!
The orange Hitler is a friggin traitor selling out out country and half the country still supports him. 😡

But Hillary’s emails were a more of a security breach!

[orangecrush]

92. K&R

[Daleuhlmann]

93. This Is What Happens When You Appoint Somebody So Unqualified to Such a Vital Position !

As Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth is totally incompetent!

[Hassler]

94. As others have said, kudos to Goldberg

For not pulling a Haberman/Woodward. He actually let us know in real time wtf these treasonous morons were doing. And of course, Sgt Schultz knows nothing. Only surprised the asshole didn't try to blame Biden. Or Obama.

[no_hypocrisy]

95. "Accidentally"?

More like:

Negligently
Grossly negligently
Recklessly
Stupidly
Mindlessly

[AdamGG]

97. They probably know it doesn't matter

since all of our military plans and intelligence information are being sent directly to Moscow anyway.

[Beacool]

98. But, but....

HILLARY'S EMAILS!!!!

This administration is a joke, a bad one, but a joke nonetheless.