Former national security adviser Mike Waltz took a page out of Donald Trump’s handbook Tuesday as he presented a wild scapegoat for his involvement in the Signalgate scandal.
During his confirmation hearing to become the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Waltz was asked about the fallout of mistakenly adding the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to a Signal group chat where several high-ranking Trump Cabinet members openly discussed highly sensitive war plans.
“Were you investigated for this disclosure of sensitive operational information on Signal?” asked Connecticut Senator Chris Coons, who noted that it was common wisdom that the app was “not an appropriate, secure means of communicating highly sensitive information.”
“Thank you Senator, and that engagement was driven by and recommended by the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency, by the Biden administration CISA guidance,” Waltz stammered, peppering his response with several “uhs” that have been removed for clarity.
“I’m sorry,” Coons cut in. “Was the use of secure information on Signal—”
“The use of, no excuse me, the use of Signal is not only—as an encrypted app—is not only authorized, it was recommended in Biden’s, the Biden era CISA guidance,” Waltz continued, somehow finding a way to blame former President Joe Biden for his own egregious gaffe.
CISA best practices guidance released in December 2024 recommended the use of Signal for “highly targeted individuals” seeking “end-to-end encryption” and protection against cyber attacks. It doesn’t note how to prevent adding journalists from top secret group chats. A 2023 memo from the Department of Defense, however, prohibited the use of Signal and other “unmanaged apps” to discuss “non-public DoD information.”
New Jersey Senator Cory Booker took Waltz to task over another of his weak attempts to pin his enormous fumble on Goldberg. Waltz had previously claimed that the editor’s phone number had been “sucked in” to his phone by “somebody else’s contact.” Waltz also claimed he didn’t know Goldberg and called him “the bottom scum of journalists.”
“You said this journalist intentionally infiltrated that Signal chain. You said that he was ‘sucked in.’ You denied, deflected, and then you did something that really, to me, really lacks integrity, is that you sought out to demean and degrade that very journalist in crass and frankly cruel ways that made him a target,” Booker said. “That’s not leadership, when you blame people that tell the truth. That’s not leadership when you can’t say the words, ‘I made a mistake.’”
The post Guess Who Mike Waltz Is Blaming Now for Signalgate? appeared first on New Republic.
