Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday that "informal, unclassified coordinations" were shared in an online chat and he added that an internal probe into leakers at the Pentagon continues.
The New York Times reported Sunday that 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.
That report followed news late last month that The Atlantic's editor-in-chief was accidentally included in a March 13 group chat with top Trump administration officials, including Hegseth and White House national security adviser Mike Waltz, who were discussing plans for military action in Yemen.
Hegseth on Tuesday blamed disgruntled Pentagon employees for leaking to the mainstream media in attempts to undermine President Donald Trump's agenda.
"This is the second go-round, right?" Hegseth said during an interview on Fox News Channel. "They peddle old stuff, they kick it back up. I said repeatedly, 'No one's texting war plans.' You know why I said that? Because I'm in the bowels of the Pentagon every single day. Just 10 minutes ago, I was looking at actual war plans of things that were ongoing or pending things to happen.
"What was shared over Signal then and now, however you characterize it, was informal unclassified coordinations for media coordination and other things. That's what I've said from the beginning."
Hegseth said there's an ongoing investigation into department leaks.
"We take the classification of information very importantly. It's very significant to us that we safeguard it," he said. "And so, when we have leaks, which we have had here, we did a very serious leak investigation and through that leak investigation, unfortunately, we found some folks that we believe were not holding to the protocols that we hold dear here at the Defense Department.
"Through that investigation, they have been moved on and that investigation continues. As a result of that, everything we do here is above board trying to make sure we safeguard information."
Hegseth's staff has undergone changes amid the Signal chat controversies. The secretary's chief of staff, Joe Kasper, has been reassigned to another position. Senior adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick, and Colin Carroll, chief of staff to Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg, were placed on administrative leave after an investigation into leaks at the agency.
All three were fired Friday, Politico reported.
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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