WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday downplayed the texting of sensitive plans for a military strike against Yemen’s Houthis this month to a group chat that included a journalist, saying it was “the only glitch in two months” of his administration as Democratic lawmakers heaped criticism on the administration for handling highly sensitive information carelessly.
Trump told NBC News that the lapse “turned out not to be a serious one,” and expressed his continued support for national security adviser Mike Waltz.
Waltz, according to an article posted online Monday by The Atlantic, appeared to have mistakenly added the magazine’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, to a chat that included 18 senior administration officials discussing planning for the strike.
“Michael Waltz has learned a lesson, and he’s a good man,” Trump said. He also appeared to point blame on an unnamed Waltz aide for Goldberg being added to the chain. “It was one of Michael’s people on the phone. A staffer had his number on there.”
But the use of messaging app Signal to discuss a sensitive operation has opened the administration to blistering criticism from Democratic lawmakers who expressed outrage at the White House’s and senior administration officials’ insistence that no classified information was shared. Senior administration officials have struggled to explain why the publicly available app was used to discuss such a delicate matter.
Waltz makes his first public comments
Waltz said Tuesday he was not sure how Goldberg ended up on the chat. “This one in particular, I’ve never met, don’t know, never communicated with,” Waltz said.
Later Tuesday, Waltz said in an appearance on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle” that he built the message chain and that White House technical experts were trying to figure out how Goldberg’s contact “may have been sucked in.”
“We made a mistake. We’re moving forward,” said Waltz, who added that he took “full responsibility” for the episode. Trump, for his part, continued to attack The Atlantic and Goldberg and sent mixed messages on whether the administration would change how it goes about sharing sensitive information going forward.
“We won’t be using it very much” in the future, Trump said of Signal. “That’s one of the prices you pay when you’re not sitting in the Situation Room with no phones on, which is always the best, frankly.”
Trump added, “If it was up to me everybody would be sitting in a room together. The room would have solid lead walls and a lead ceiling and lead floor.”
One official reported to be on the Signal chain, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, acknowledged during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Tuesday that she was traveling overseas during the exchange. She wouldn’t say whether she was using her personal or government-issued phone because the matter is under review by the White House National Security Council.
