A US government watchdog has submitted to Congress its report into Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s use of Signal to share information of strikes on Yemen’s Houthis. The watchdog is said to have received evidence that the information was indeed classified at the time.
A US government watchdog has submitted its report of an investigation into Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sharing information of strikes on Houthi terrorists in Yemen on Signal app, according to CNN.
The investigation has been conducted by the Inspector General (IG) of the Department of Defense at the request of Chairman Roger F Wicker and Ranking Member Jack Reed of Senate Armed Services Committee.
The IG was investigating the Signal chat that involved top US officials like Vice President JD Vance, Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, then-National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard. Hegseth shared specific details of imminent strikes on Houthis in the chat.
The chats came to light in March after
Waltz inadvertently added The Atlantic’s Editor Jeffrey Goldberg to the Signal group. Without the knowledge of anyone in the group, Goldberg witnessed the entire discussion about the attack. He also saw Hegseth sharing specifics of the attack before and after the operation began.
In addition to submitting the full, classified report to Congress, the IG is expected to publicly release a declassified, redacted version of the report on Thursday, two sources told CNN.
Even though Hegseth and other officials involved in the case have denied wrongdoing, President Donald Trump fired Waltz as the NSA.
IG report finds Hegseth’s info to be confidential
The IG received evidence that the
information that Hegseth shared in the Signal chat was classified, according to CNN.
The document from which the information came was marked Secret/NOFORN [not for foreign eyes], as per the report.
But as Hegseth has classification authority, he could claim that he had declassified that information and try to get away from any consequences. But it is not clear
Hegseth has original classification authority, so he was authorized to declassify any information before he shared it, sources told CNN at the time. But it’s unclear if he indeed declassified the document.
In any case, Signal was not among authorised platforms for government officials to discuss such sensitive affairs.
While officials at the time said that nothing was wrong in the conversation, the IG’s report also found that Hegseth also shared the plan of attack on Houthis in another chat that had his wife, brother, and personal lawyer, according to CNN.
Separately, a witness told the IG that Hegseth’s usage of a non-governmental platform, Signal, for Houthi strikes not a first. In fact, the witness said that they had been part of around a dozen such chats.
In March, Hegseth shared specifics of the attack well in advance, such as timing and the type of aircraft to be used.
Irrespective of whatever Hegseth and other said, such type of information is always classified and is marked ‘Secret, NOFORN’, which means that it is secret and cannot be shared with anyone outside of the government, not even with a treaty ally like Five Eyes members, Fox Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin reported at the time.
In the chat,
as per messages published by The Atlantic’s Goldberg, Hegseth said US F-18 fighter planes would launch at 12:15 pm, F-18s’ time window to attack would start at 01:45 pm, and a second batch of F-18s would launch at 02:10 pm, and first strikes from F-18s and MQ-9 drones would be expected at 02:15 pm, and the second round of strikes from F-18s and Tomahawks missiles would start at 03:36 pm.
At the time, a former senior defence official told Griffin that such ‘attack orders’ or ‘attack sequence’ “puts the joint force directly and immediately at risk” and “allows the enemy to move the target and increase lethal actions against US forces”.
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