Look, we’ve all made mistakes at work. Admittedly, adding the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to a top-secret security briefing Signal group chat on impending military action is a pretty big goof, but hey, everyone gets a mulligan, right?
Well, I’m sorry to inform you that it’s now been revealed that Pete Hegseth was involved in a completely separate other Signal group chat in which he was also spewing national secrets to all and sundry. This is, to put it mildly, not the kind of behavior you’re looking for from the literal Secretary of Defense.
SignalGate is back.
— Evan (@daviddunn177) April 20, 2025
This time it includes Pete Hegseth’s wife & brother. pic.twitter.com/QtM0e2bD6J
The story comes via The New York Times, which confirmed that Hegseth created a Signal group chat including his wife, brother, and around a dozen other randos. Because, naturally, you want your best buds in the group to know “detailed information about the planned attacks”, including the flight schedules of the F/A-18 Hornets on a mission to strike Yemen.
Why on earth Hegseth thought his wife and brother needed to know this is anyone’s guess. Maybe he meant to send them a message asking them to pick up some milk from the store, and simply sent the details of the critical attack by mistake? The Times also points out that included in that chat were Dan Caldwell and Darin Selnick, the duo given the boot from the Pentagon last week for leaking unauthorized information.
At this point, it might be time to remove the “intelligence” from “United States intelligence community” and replace it with something else. “Incompetent” perhaps? “Bumbling idiots” maybe? How about “Crushingly inexperienced”?
The cherry on top of all this is that Hegseth didn’t even use his government device to host these critical national secrets, but his private phone. That slapping sound you hear is the NSA hitting their foreheads in exasperation at Hegseth leaving holes in national security large enough to drive an Abrams tank through.
All of which makes the recent opinion piece by John Ullyot – Hegseth’s former press secretary – all the more pointed: “It’s been a month of total chaos at the Pentagon. From leaks of sensitive operational plans to mass firings, the dysfunction is now a major distraction for the president — who deserves better from his senior leadership.”
Maybe, in retrospect, appointing the co-host of Fox & Friends Weekend to run the nation’s military wasn’t the hottest idea in the world?
Published: Apr 21, 2025 07:23 am