In sitting down with The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg, President Donald Trump said he spoke with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on the Signal chat controversies, and expressed confidence his embattled Pentagon leader will turn it around after a rocky start.
"I think he's gonna get it together," Trump told The Atlantic in an Oval Office exclusive published Monday morning.
"I had a talk with him, a positive talk, but I had a talk with him."
Trump also repeated his support for national security adviser Mike Waltz, who has been tied to having added Goldberg to the Signal chat. Goldberg subsequently wrote a series of stories alleging the Trump administration and senior officials mishandled top secret information.
Waltz was "fine" after being "beat up" for the mistaken addition of the reporter to the Signal chat to discuss strikes on Yemen's Houthi terrorists, Trump told Goldberg.
Trump reportedly told his staff after the flak: "Maybe don't use Signal, OK?"
Hegseth has called out the "fake news" media attacks over his use of Signal chats with senior Trump administration officials and has repeatedly denied ever leaking or mishandling any classified information.
"We talking about a deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who's made a profession peddling hoaxes time and time again – to including the, I don't know, the Russia, Russia, Russia, the 'fine people on both sides' hoax, or 'suckers and losers' hoax: This is a guy that peddles in garbage," Hegseth said in a pointed rebuke of Goldberg when he first reported on the Signal chat this spring.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.