Details about American strikes in Yemen that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared on a commercial chat app came from U.S. Central Command through a secure, government system designed for sending classified information, according to an official and a person familiar with the conversations.
The chats last month on the Signal app contained the times and sequencing for the launches of American fighter jets. A journalist as well as Mr. Hegseth’s wife, brother and personal lawyer were included in the chats.
The Atlantic reported more than a month ago that its editor had been inadvertently included in one Signal chat group about the strikes before they took place. On Sunday, The New York Times reported that the defense secretary also revealed information about the Yemen strikes in a second group chat.
Mr. Hegseth has not acknowledged any wrongdoing.
The Pentagon’s acting inspector general announced earlier this month that he would review Mr. Hegseth’s Yemen strike disclosures on Signal.
Senator Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican who chairs the Armed Services Committee, and the committee’s senior Democrat, Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, requested the review. In a letter last month, the senators asked the inspector general to “conduct an inquiry” into whether Mr. Hegseth had shared sensitive or classified information in the first group chat.
In an appearance on Fox News on Tuesday, Mr. Hegseth continued to press a semantic argument.
“I said repeatedly, nobody is texting war plans,” he said. “What was shared over Signal then and now, however you characterize it, was informal, unclassified coordinations, for media coordinations and other things.”
Mr. Hegseth accused members of his own staff, whom he had brought to the Defense Department but fired last week, of leaking news of the chats, saying they were angry about being let go.
“Once a leaker, always a leaker, often a leaker,” Mr. Hegseth said, appearing on Fox from the Pentagon briefing room.
“But I know you know these guys,” the host, Brian Kilmeade, said to Mr. Hegseth. “These are the guys you picked.”
Mr. Hegseth responded by saying that details of ongoing Defense Department issues, including one relating to the Panama Canal, had been leaked to the news media and that a subsequent investigation “led to some unfortunate places.”
The revelation that Mr. Hegseth received the information he put on the Signal chats straight from Central Command via a secure government system is only the latest in what his former press spokesman has referred to as a “month from hell.”
The news about Central Command was reported earlier by NBC. The U.S. official and a person familiar who confirmed the report spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
Besides the disclosures of the Signal chats, in the past month Mr. Hegseth has seen the dissolution of his inner circle of close advisers — military veterans who, like him, had little experience running large, complex organizations. Three members of the team he brought with him into the Pentagon were accused last week of leaking unauthorized information and escorted from the building.
A fourth former member of Mr. Hegseth’s staff, John Ullyot, accused Mr. Hegseth of disloyalty and incompetence in an opinion essay in Politico on Sunday. “The building is in disarray under Hegseth’s leadership,” he said. Mr. Ullyot was Mr. Hegseth’s top spokesman before he also left the Pentagon.
President Trump has continued to back his defense secretary. “Pete’s doing a great job,” the president told reporters on Monday at the White House Easter Egg Roll.
“There’s no dysfunction,” Mr. Trump added.
Helene Cooper is a Pentagon correspondent. She was previously an editor, diplomatic correspondent and White House correspondent.
Eric Schmitt is a national security correspondent for The Times, focusing on U.S. military affairs and counterterrorism issues overseas, topics he has reported on for more than three decades.
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