President Donald Trump is standing by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth as some Democrats have called for him to resign because of a leaked Signal chat that had information about a military strike in Yemen.<\/p>\n
The president talked about the controversy after Hegseth sent details about the strike to people in the administration in a Signal chat that included Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, by mistake. Goldberg published the full messages on Wednesday morning.<\/p>\n
After several Democrats in Congress called for Hegseth to step down because of the scandal, reporters asked Trump if he thought Hegseth might want to resign.<\/p>\n
\u201cHegseth is doing a great job, he had nothing to do with this. Hegseth. How do you bring Hegseth into this?\u201d Trump replied.<\/p>\n
Trump also acknowledged that his White House national security advisor, Mike Waltz, took responsibility for mistakenly adding Goldberg to the Signal chat.<\/p>\n
\u201cMike Waltz \u2026 he claimed responsibility, I would imagine. It had nothing to do with anyone else. It was Mike, I guess, I don\u2019t know, I was told it was Mike,\u201d Trump said when asked about the investigation.<\/p>\n
Trump again played down the controversy over whether or not Hegseth shared secret information that could have put the operation at risk by focusing on the mission\u2019s success.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was no harm done because the attack was unbelievably successful that night,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
Trump asked Democrats why they were calling for Hegseth to step down and questioned whether the Signal app was even working right.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, it\u2019s all a witch hunt \u2026 you wanna ask about whether or not Signal works, I don\u2019t know if Signal works, I think that Signal could be defective to be honest with you,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
The encrypted app that deletes messages after they have been received is popular in Washington, DC, for communications.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou use Signal, we use Signal, and everybody uses Signal, but it could be a defective platform, and we\u2019re going to have to find that out,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
Arizona Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly called for Hegseth\u2019s resignation for sharing details of the operation on the platform.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Signal incident is what happens when you have the most unqualified Secretary of Defense we\u2019ve ever seen. We\u2019re lucky it didn\u2019t cost any servicemembers their lives, but for the safety of our military and our country, Secretary Hegseth needs to resign,\u201d Kelly wrote on X.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis could have gotten our men and women killed!\u201d Gallego wrote on social media. \u201cThe Secretary of Defense needs to resign. The incompetence and cover up is embarrassing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hegseth fired back on X, insisting that he did not share any classified information in the chat and criticized The Atlantic for mischaracterizing his texts as \u201cwar plans\u201d on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Atlantic released the so-called \u2018war plans\u2019 and those \u2018plans\u2019 include: No names. No targets. No locations. No units. No routes. No sources. No methods. And no classified information. Those are some really sh***y war plans,\u201d Hegseth wrote on X.<\/p>\n
Hegseth sent a message called \u201cTeam Update\u201d to a group of top Trump administration officials on March 15 that included information about the planned military strikes, including when they would happen and what weapons would be used.<\/p>\n
Hegseth argued he was only providing a \u201cteam update,\u201d repeating that he did not share any \u2018war plans.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cMy job \u2013 team update, to provide updates in real time. General updates in real time keep everybody informed. That is what I did. That\u2019s my job,\u201d Hegseth added.<\/p>\n
Secretary of State Marco Rubio also responded to questions about the incident.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, someone made a mistake, someone made a big mistake and added a journalist. Nothing against journalists but you ain\u2019t supposed to be on that thing. None of the information on there at any point threatened the operation or the lives of our servicemen,\u201d Rubio said, adding that there was no classified information on the chat.<\/p>\n
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