The White House lashed out at The New York Times report of a second Signal messaging chat created by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that included his wife and brother and in which he shared details of a March military airstrike against Yemen's Houthi terrorists, insisting that no classified information was shared.
White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said that "no matter how many times the legacy media tries to resurrect the same non-story, they can't change the fact that no classified information was shared."
She added "recently fired 'leakers' are continuing to misrepresent the truth to soothe their shattered egos and undermine the president's agenda, but the administration will continue to hold them accountable."
The second chat on Signal — which is a commercially available app not authorized to be used to communicate sensitive or classified national defense information — had 13 people in the group that included Hegseth's wife, Jennifer, who is a former Fox News producer, and his brother Phil Hegseth, who was hired at the Pentagon as a Department of Homeland Security liaison and senior adviser, according to The New York Times. Both have traveled with the defense secretary and attended high-level meetings.
Sean Parnell, assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, called the Times report a resurrection from the dead on Easter Sunday.
"Another day, another old story—back from the dead," Parnell wrote in a statement to Newsmax. "The Trump-hating media continues to be obsessed with destroying anyone committed to President Trump's agenda.
"This time, The New York Times — and all other Fake News that repeat their garbage — are enthusiastically taking the grievances of disgruntled former employees as the sole sources for their article. They relied only on the words of people who were fired this week and appear to have a motive to sabotage the secretary and the President's agenda.
"There was no classified information in any Signal chat, no matter how many ways they try to write the story. What is true is that the Office of the Secretary of Defense is continuing to become stronger and more efficient in executing President Trump's agenda.
"We've already achieved so much for the American warfighter, and will never back down."
Material from The Associated Press was used to compile this report.
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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