Key events
Archie Bland
Look, it could happen to anyone: I well remember, for example, the time I added my mum to a thread with my siblings discussing what to get her for Christmas.
On the other hand, I don’t have a secure communications facility in my house for when I need to get something out on the family group chat.
Also, we rarely digress from pictures of cute kids to setting out war plans for an imminent set of airstrikes on the Houthis in Yemen.
So perhaps the latest Trump administration hullabaloo isn’t that relatable, after all. Two days after the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg revealed that he had been mystifyingly added to a thread on Signal – an encrypted WhatsApp-like instant messaging app – in which vice-president JD Vance, defence secretary Pete Hegseth, and a host of others chatted about a highly sensitive operation, there are as many questions as answers.
How on earth did Goldberg get added in the first place? Why didn’t anybody realise the error? Are White House officials doing this all the time? And how vulnerable are their communications to interception from America’s adversaries?
Today’s newsletter explains this absolute dumpster fire of a story, and why it matters:
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Mike Waltz has said he takes “full responsibility” for the security breach, as he had created the Signal group, but emphasised there was no classified information shared.
Democrats urge US justice department probe of war plans discussion on Signal
Democratic US Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and top Senate Democrats on Wednesday wrote a letter to Republican president Donald Trump and his top officials urging a justice department probe into how a journalist was inadvertently included in a secret group discussion of sensitive war plans.
Trump administration officials have claimed no classified material was shared in the group chat on Signal, an encrypted commercial messaging app.
Democratic senators voiced scepticism, noting that the journalist, Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, reported that defence secretary Pete Hegseth posted operational details about pending strikes against Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis, “including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.”
“We write to you with extreme alarm about the astonishingly poor judgment shown by your Cabinet and national security advisers,” the Democratic senators wrote in Wednesday’s letter, Reuters reported.
“Moreover, given that wilful or negligent disclosure of classified or sensitive national security information may constitute a criminal violation of the Espionage Act or other laws, we expect attorney general Bondi to conduct a thorough and impartial investigation of the conduct of the government officials involved in improperly sharing or discussing such information,” the letter added.
Trump said his administration would look into the use of Signal but voiced support for his national security team when questioned about the incident at a White House event on Tuesday with Michael Waltz, his national security adviser.
Trump said he did not think Waltz should apologise, but said he did not think Waltz and the team would be using Signal again soon.
Denmark welcomes US change of Greenland visit
Denmark’s foreign minister on Wednesday welcomed a US decision to alter a planned visit to Greenland that had sparked a diplomatic standoff between Copenhagen and the White House amid President’s Donald Trump’s interest in taking over the island.
Denmark’s prime minister had said on Tuesday that a planned visit by Usha Vance, the wife of US vice-president JD Vance, to a popular dog-sled race in Greenland was part of an “unacceptable pressure” on the semi-autonomous Danish territory.
The White House on Tuesday announced that the delegation would instead be headed by JD Vance himself, but that it would only visit the US Space Base at Pituffik in northern Greenland and not the dog-sled race, Reuters reported.
“I think it’s very positive that the Americans cancelled their visit to the Greenlandic society. Instead, they will visit their own base, Pituffik, and we have nothing against that,” foreign minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told broadcaster DR.
Homeland security secretary Noem visits the El Salvador prison where deported Venezuelans are held
Homeland security secretary Kristi Noem on Wednesday will visit the high-security El Salvador prison where Venezuelans who the Trump administration alleges are members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang have been held since their removal from the US.
Noem’s trip to the prison – where inmates are packed into cells and never allowed outside – comes as the Trump administration seeks to show it is deporting people it describes as the “worst of the worst.”
Since taking office, Noem has often been front and center in efforts to highlight the immigration crackdown, AP reported.
She took part in immigration enforcement operations, rode horses with Border Patrol agents and was the face of a television campaign warning people in the country illegally to self-deport.
Noem’s Wednesday visit is part of a three-day trip. She will also travel to Colombia and Mexico.
US intelligence officials to appear at House hearing over leaked military plan
Good morning and welcome to the US politics live blog. My name is Tom Ambrose and I’ll be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.
We start with news that Donald Trump’s top intelligence officials will brief House members on Wednesday on global threats facing the US where it is likely they will be questioned again over use of a group text to discuss plans for military strikes in Yemen.
CIA director John Ratcliffe, director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and FBI director Kash Patel are among those who were asked to testify before the House Intelligence Committee as part of its annual review of threats facing the US.
Tuesday’s hearing was dominated by questions about Ratcliffe and Gabbard’s participation in a group chat on Signal in which they discussed plans to strike Houthi rebels in Yemen. The group included a journalist, The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg.
Gabbard and Ratcliffe have said no classified information was included in the messages, but Democrats have decried the use of the messaging app, saying that any release of information about timetables, weapons or military activities could have put US service members at risk.
At Tuesday’s hearing they asked Patel, who was not a participant in the text chain, if he would investigate. It is likely House Democrats will press Patel on the same question on Wednesday.
The national security council has said it will investigate the matter, which Trump on Tuesday downplayed as a “glitch”. Goldberg said he received the Signal invitation from Mike Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, who was also in the group chat.
In other news:
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The Senate voted to confirm Marty Makary as the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration and Jay Bhattacharya as director of the National Institutes of Health. Both men were skeptics of the Covid-19 response.
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In a letter to Trump on Tuesday, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the leader of the Democratic minority in the House, demanded that the president fire his defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, for disclosing secret war plans for strikes on Yemen to a Signal group that included a journalist.
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Ignoring the uproar in Greenland over the plan for his wife, Usha Vance, to visit the territory this week without an invitation, the US vice-president, JD Vance, announced in a video message that he plans to join her. The White House did, however, scrap plans for the second lady to attend a public event.
