Report: Hegseth Shared Attack Plans in 2nd Signal Chat Sparks Critics' Fury

Miami Herald

21-04-2025

According to a Sunday report from The New York Times, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared "detailed information" about forthcoming strikes in Yemen on March 15 in a private Signal group chat that included his wife, brother and personal lawyer.
Four people with knowledge of the chat told the Times the information included flight schedules for F/A-18 Hornets targeting Houthi rebels in Yemen-essentially the same attack plans the defense secretary shared on a separate Signal chat that mistakenly included an editor from The Atlantic the same day.
Newsweek reached out to the Department of Defense via email for comment on Sunday.
The reported existence of a second Signal chat in which Hegseth allegedly shared highly sensitive military information is the latest in a series of developments that have put his management and judgment under scrutiny.
President Donald Trump's top national security officials including Hegseth previously discussed U.S. military plans in Yemen on a Signal chat group that included The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg.
Details of U.S. military operations are not supposed to be conducted over publicly available platforms such as Signal, and a number of security experts have said the chat group could have violated the Espionage Act.
Officials on the chat group faced bipartisan criticism including a lawsuit from nonpartisan watchdog group American Oversight, which alleged breaches of the Federal Records Act and the Administrative Procedure Act by conducting government business on a platform which erases communications.
Jennifer Rauchet Hegseth: The defense secretary's wife is a former Fox News producer who is not a Defense Department employee. She has traveled with her husband overseas and drawn criticism for accompanying him to sensitive meetings with foreign leaders. Rauchet was a producer on Fox and Friends, a show that Hegseth began co-hosting in 2017. She is Hegseth's third wife and the couple shares a 7-year-old daughter.
Phil Hegseth: The defense secretary's brother works at the Pentagon as a senior adviser to Hegseth and is a liaison between the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon. His role involves interfacing with agencies like the U.S. Coast Guard and Homeland Security Investigations. Phil recently joined his brother aboard a Pentagon aircraft during an Indo-Pacific tour. His previous experience includes founding a podcast production company, managing digital media at the conservative Hudson Institute, and working with his brother at Concerned Veterans for America where he earned $108,000 as a media consultant.
Timothy C. Parlatore: Hegseth's personal lawyer was directly commissioned as a Navy commander in the Judge Advocate General's Corps as a reservist in a Pentagon ceremony on March 5. Parlatore previously gained prominence as part of Trump's legal defense team after the president was charged with multiple felonies in the classified documents case.
Unlike the previously reported Signal chat created by national security adviser Mike Waltz, this newly revealed one was allegedly created by Hegseth, the newspaper reported. It included his wife Jennifer and about a dozen other people from his personal and professional inner circle in January, before his confirmation as defense secretary, and was named "Defense | Team Huddle," the people familiar with the chat told the Times. He instead used his private phone rather than his government one to access the Signal chat.
Hegseth created the separate Signal group initially as a forum for discussing routine administrative or scheduling information, two people familiar with the chat said. The anonymous sources told the Times that Hegseth typically did not use the chat to discuss sensitive military operations and said it did not include other Cabinet-level officials.
Another person familiar with the chat said Hegseth's aides had warned him a day or two before the Yemen strikes not to discuss such sensitive operational details in the group chat, which, while encrypted, is not considered as secure as government channels typically used for discussing highly sensitive war planning and combat operations.
The Signal chat until recently included about a dozen of Hegseth's top aides, including Joe Kasper, Hegseth's chief of staff, and Sean Parnell, the Pentagon's chief spokesman. The chat also included two senior advisers to Hegseth-Dan Caldwell and Darin Selnick. Both were accused of leaking unauthorized information last week and were fired.
Reuters reported on April 15 that Caldwell was escorted out of the Pentagon and placed under administrative leave due to "an unauthorized disclosure."
An official from the Pentagon later confirmed to Newsweek via email that Selnick "has also been placed on administrative leave pending investigation."
Caldwell and Selnick, along with another former top Pentagon official, proclaimed their innocence in a Saturday statement on X, formerly Twitter, responding to the leak inquiry that led to their dismissals.
According to Politico, citing a defense official, the investigation is focused on leaks pertaining to military plans for a second aircraft carrier headed to the Red Sea, the Panama Canal, pausing intelligence collection to Ukraine amid its ongoing war with Russia and a visit to the Pentagon from billionaire Elon Musk who leads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
In a March memo, Joe Kasper, Hegseth's chief of staff, mentioned the investigation into the leaks: "Recent unauthorized disclosures of national security information involving sensitive communications with principals within the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) demand immediate and thorough investigation."
Sean Parnell, chief Pentagon spokesperson, on X last month: "For too long, instances of unauthorized disclosures of national security information have gone uninvestigated at the DoD. @SecDef is committed to aggressively pursuing parties responsible for any leaks and will refer them to law enforcement for criminal prosecution. Efforts to subvert @POTUS command of our Armed Forces, to endanger the lives of our warfighters, or to harm our national security will not be tolerated. ACCOUNTABILITY IS BACK."
Former chief Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot wrote an opinion article for Politico following the second report: "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."
The Pentagon's acting inspector general Steven Stebbins announced earlier this month that he would review Hegseth's Yemen strike disclosures on the Signal chat: "The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the secretary of defense and other DoD personnel complied with DoD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business."
Fred Wellman, U.S. Army combat veteran and host of On Democracy with FPWellman podcast on MeidasTouch, wrote on X on Sunday: "This is even worse than the last one. Hegseth created a Signal group with friends and family and shared highly classified strike plans on his PERSONAL phone. @SecDef must resign! Take your propagandist buddies with you!"
Mike Nellis, former senior adviser to former Vice President Kamala Harris, wrote on X: "Trump needs to fire Pete Hegseth. He's a complete trainwreck. His office is a damn mess, and he can't stop leaking national security secrets. What the hell are you thinking, putting your wife and brother on a text chain with war plans?"
Representative Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat, wrote on X: "Hegseth should just tell us how many chat rooms he was leaking confidential information to. Let's just get to the bottom of this now instead of it leaking out over the next few months."
Retired U.S. Army General Barry R. McCaffrey wrote on X: "A stunning security failure by Sec Def. His personal phone assuredly targeted by foreign adversaries. His wife not cleared for classified info."
American sports and political commentator Keith Olbermann wrote on X: "BREAKING: The Secretary of Vodka shared actual battle plans on Signal with the Missus."
Founder of the left-leaning think tank People's Policy Project Matt Bruenig on X: "Hegseth wife probably just texted back 'that's so cool, glad you are having fun'"
Wajahat Ali,columnist and co-host of Democracy-ish podcast, wrote on X: "Good lord. Bring Back DEI. Hire competent people. This isn't a game, MAGA."
The Pentagon's acting inspector general is reviewing Hegseth's Yemen initial strike disclosures on the Signal chat that included top Trump aides, however it's unclear whether this review has uncovered the second Signal chat.
This review was initiated in response to a joint bipartisan request from the Senate Armed Services Committee leadership.
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