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Trump administration officials strongly refuted any wrongdoing after The Atlantic published private Signal messages from Department of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt chided the outlet for changing their characterization of the thread from “war plans” to “attack plans” just one day after breaking the original story.
“The Atlantic has even admitted this themselves. Their release of these internal messages validates the truth, which we have been saying all along. If this story proves anything, it proves that Democrats and their propagandists in the mainstream media know how to fabricate, orchestrate, and disseminate a misinformation campaign quite well. And there’s arguably no one in the media who loves manufacturing and pushing hoaxes more than Jeffrey Goldberg,” Leavitt told the press during a briefing.
Leavitt emphasized that “no classified information was discussed,” and pointed to the various department heads who testified to that under oath on Tuesday and Wednesday.
National Security Advisor Mike Waltz made clear that no classified information was disclosed. In a post on X, Waltz wrote, “No locations. No sources & methods. NO WAR PLANS. Foreign partners had already been notified that strikes were imminent. BOTTOM LINE: President Trump is protecting America and our interests.”
Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell posted a statement on X, blasting the outlet for its sly backpedaling. “It’s no surprise hoax-peddlers at the Atlantic have already abandoned their ‘war plans’ claim. These additional Signal chat messages confirm there were no classified materials or war plans shared. The Secretary was merely updating the group on a plan that was underway & had already been briefed through official channels. The American people see through the Atlantic’s pathetic attempts to distract from President Trump’s national security agenda.”
DOD Rapid Response remarked in a post, “They backpedaled the whole ‘war plans’ thing really really fast.”
Hegseth hammered the outlet for revising its sensational headline while speaking to the press in Hawaii. “Nobody’s texting war plans. I noticed this morning, out came something that doesn’t look like war plans. As a matter of fact, they even changed the title to ‘attack plans’… There’s no units, no locations, no routes, no flight paths, no sources, no methods, no classified information.”
