EXCLUSIVE — The individual or individuals responsible for inadvertently adding a journalist to a group chat of senior U.S. officials discussing military operations should get fired, former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta told the Washington Examiner.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, national security adviser Mike Waltz, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard were among a group of senior U.S. officials who discussed on the platform Signal the possibility of the U.S. military conducting an offensive campaign against the Houthis in Yemen.
Signal is an encrypted app, but it has not been approved by the government for classified communications.
Unbeknownst to the officials, Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of the Atlantic, was added to the chat, apparently by accident. He went on to witness the group discuss sensitive matters surrounding U.S. plans to strike the Houthis. The journalist stayed in the chat until after the United States began its military campaign last weekend.
“They should find out who added Jeffrey Goldberg’s name to that list and fire that person,” Panetta said. “That was an act of gross negligence.”
A user who identified as Waltz added Goldberg to the chat, he wrote.
“In my experience, there is nothing more sensitive and more highly classified than war plans or military attack plans. Those are extremely sensitive because leaking any of that information would not only alert the enemy but could very well jeopardize lives and could endanger intelligence sources,” Panetta added. “This is very serious.”
In the group chat, the officials, unaware of Goldberg’s presence, debated the merits of launching a military campaign against the Houthis and ultimately celebrated the early results of the approved strikes.
“It’s hard to believe that at least somebody in the intelligence arena didn’t say, ‘This is not the way to handle this kind of classified information.’ So I’m a little surprised that Signal was used for a discussion of the highest national security leaders on a potential military attack,” Panetta explained. “It just boggles the mind.”
The National Security Council told the Washington Examiner, “At this time, the message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain,” while Hegseth denigrated Goldberg in his first public comments about the leak.
The former CIA director and secretary of defense argued that there should be a congressional investigation into the incident. Several members have shown an interest in investigating.
Ratcliffe and Gabbard are expected to appear before the House and Senate Intelligence committees this week, and some members of Congress have already indicated they intend to ask about the report. Other members have said they, too, want additional information on what occurred.
“There is likely to be classified briefings about this soon,” Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) said. “It’s a concern and it’s a matter we just learned about today. I think we’ll absolutely be looking into it, no question … it appears that mistakes were made, no question.”