The Trump administration, in a remarkable escalation of its campaign to crack down on leaks, has directed the U.S. military to explore bringing a criminal case against a top general whom the Pentagon’s political leadership accused of giving sensitive information to journalists, according to people familiar with the matter.
The development, which has not been previously reported, means that Lt. Gen. Brett Sylvia now faces legal jeopardy on two fronts after the allegations made by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s team at the Pentagon were previously referred to the Justice Department.
A U.S. official, speaking like some others on the condition of anonymity to discuss the Defense Department’s burgeoning case against Sylvia, confirmed that the matter was delegated “for appropriate disposition” to Adam Telle, the acting Army secretary.
Attempts to reach Sylvia were unsuccessful and he has not spoken publicly about the allegations. To date, neither the military nor federal law enforcement has charged Sylvia with a crime. Until his firing last month, Sylvia, 54, reported to Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as head of plans and policy for the Joint Staff. A spokesperson for the Joint Staff declined to comment.
The aggressive pursuit of a criminal case against such a high-ranking military official follows Hegseth’s long-standing vow to find and punish those who have spoken with the news media about his stewardship of the Pentagon, particularly amid the Iran war. It’s part of an expansive effort by the Trump administration to target suspected leakers, a campaign that in the Defense Department has included widespread use of polygraphs and nondisclosure agreements.
“Our commitment was not an empty promise,” Hegseth’s chief spokesman, Sean Parnell, wrote on social media Oct. 29, after the news of Sylvia’s firing was reported. “We vowed to find you, and we meant it.”
The Justice Department has not confirmed that federal authorities are looking into the Pentagon’s claims. In a brief statement, the agency said only that it has “ongoing investigations related to possible leaks of classified information” and that it works closely with “our government partners,” including the Defense Department. A spokesperson declined to address questions about Sylvia’s case specifically.
Asked for comment, Hegseth’s office referred to Parnell’s statement from last month. A spokesman for the Army secretary referred questions to Hegseth’s office.
Whether the Justice Department or the Defense Department can secure a conviction is uncertain. A previous attempt by Hegseth’s team to punish suspected leakers went nowhere after the case was referred to federal law enforcement.
Veterans of the military justice system said that any prosecution of Sylvia in that venue would face significant legal and logistical hurdles, not the least of which is the involvement of Hegseth’s team in pushing for the general to face disciplinary action. The process, these people said, is designed to be free of interference from senior officials in a service member’s chain of the command.
Ultimately, the point of Sylvia’s case may not be to secure a conviction, but to send a message, said retired Army officer Franklin Rosenblatt, a lawyer and associate professor at Mississippi Christian University’s School of Law. “In many recent national security controversies in the second Trump administration,” he said, “the process is the punishment, and cases are brought without a realistic view of whether the government can take them to trial and secure a conviction.”
Parnell’s social media post on Oct. 29 strongly implied that the general had put American service members at risk through the “intentional, unauthorized disclosure of classified information.” An internal investigation, Parnell said, had been “extensive.”
But precisely what Sylvia is alleged to have done has not been detailed by the government publicly — only in media accounts that have relied on what appear to be selective leaks authorized by the Pentagon.
For instance, in the hours after news surfaced that Sylvia had been fired, a number of conservative journalists shared a statement attributed to an unidentified “War Department official,” the name that the Trump administration uses for the Defense Department. The statement alleged that “Sylvia is the subject of an investigation for leaking classified information about the Iran War, the war between Russia and Ukraine, and more” and went on to accuse him of “meeting with journalists outside of the Pentagon” to circumvent restrictions that Hegseth’s team put in place curtailing reporters’ access to the building.
The U.S. official who confirmed that Hegseth had delegated Sylvia’s case to the Army secretary alleged that the general acknowledged to military investigators having taken notes from government material classified as secret and provided information from it to a reporter. Sylvia, this official alleged, also told investigators that he communicated with a reporter through the commercial messaging application Signal but deleted the chat.
Others familiar with the case have said that Sylvia failed numerous polygraph tests during the Pentagon’s search for potential leakers and that he told colleagues he acknowledged having relationships with reporters but denied disclosing classified information to them.
Axios, citing an internal military report that it reviewed, reported on Oct. 29 that the general admitted to leaking information to journalists from two media outlets.
The Post has not independently verified these claims and the Pentagon, when asked, declined to share a copy of its internal investigation.
It is far from a foregone conclusion that the government can build a strong enough case to prosecute Sylvia, people familiar with the matter said. For instance, it is unclear whether the general, if he did convey information to a reporter, may have generalized the material to avoid disclosing classified information, as senior military officers routinely do when speaking at news briefings. Moreover, deleting a Signal chat, if it occurred, does not prove anything by itself, these people said.
If the case does move forward within the Defense Department, it could place extraordinary pressure on the military justice system, which rarely tries generals for alleged crimes and even more infrequently has a sitting defense secretary and his political team so directly involved in pushing the allegations.
Once a general is appointed to oversee the case, he or she is expected to act fairly and impartially. Should the general decide to proceed with a case, an Article 32 hearing serves as a significant early step to decide whether there is a basis for a trial, known as a court-martial. Typically, such hearings are open to the public, with partial exceptions granted if there is a need to discuss classified information, said Eugene R. Fidell, a visiting lecturer at Yale Law School with decades of experience in the military justice system.
A jury comprising eight of Sylvia’s peers probably would decide his fate if the case were then sent to court-martial. By regulation, the jurors must be higher in rank than the accused — meaning four-star generals, three-star generals with more time at that grade than Sylvia, or retired generals with equivalent experience, Fidell said. They could come from the Army or any other branch of service.
In addition to possible charges focused on the alleged dissemination of classified information, the military justice system includes a “broad arsenal of potential charges,” said Rosenblatt, the law professor at Mississippi Christian University. That includes a failure to obey a lawful order or regulation, conduct unbecoming an officer and contemptuous words against senior civilian officials, he added.
If charges are brought, Sylvia’s defense team “almost certainly” will bring up unlawful command influence, Rosenblatt said. Known as the “mortal enemy of military justice,” UCI occurs when a superior seeks a certain outcome by pressuring personnel who are ultimately subordinate to them.
The statement from an unidentified “War Department official” that was circulated selectively after Sylvia’s firing alleged that the general had been ousted for “severe misconduct” and that he had failed three polygraph tests. The “extent of his leaking became so critical” that Hegseth had to remove him, the statement said. “Urgent action was needed and could not wait another second,” it said.
Rosenblatt said the emphasis on polygraphs is “problematic” because the results are inadmissible in court. A judge could determine that the Defense Department’s public claims about Sylvia’s polygraph results could taint a pool of prospective jurors, he added.
“The jury,” Rosenblatt said, “is charged with determining who is credible and who is lying, not machines.”
Perry Stein contributed to this report.
The post Pentagon prepares its own prosecution of general accused of leaking appeared first on Washington Post.
