Jeffrey Goldberg, the rabidly anti-Trump editor-in-chief of the failing Atlantic, has doubled down on his latest hit piece.
Goldberg alleges that Hegseth disseminated classified military plans via an unsecured group chat—a charge that Hegseth has firmly denied.
Goldberg — the same disgraced journalist behind the infamous and widely debunked “suckers and losers” hoax against President Trump — published a story alleging that Hegseth, along with National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Vice President J.D. Vance, and other Trump officials, was part of a Signal group chat discussing military strikes against Iran-backed Houthi terrorists in Yemen.
According to Goldberg, it all started with a Signal connection request from Mike Waltz on March 11, followed by an invite to the chat on March 13—just days before America bombs the Iran-backed Houthi terrorists in Yemen.
Goldberg claims he sat back and watched as Trump’s heavyweights supposedly texted war plans right under his nose.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth isn’t taking this lying down. After landing at a military base in Pearl Harbor, Hegseth torched Goldberg and his hit piece:
“You’re talking about a deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again, including the hoaxes of Russia, Russia, Russia, the “fine people on both sides” hoax, and the “Suckers and Losers” hoax. This is the guy that peddles in garbage. This is what he does,” Hegseth told the reporters.
He continued, “I’ve heard that was characterized. Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that.”
Despite Hegseth’s crystal-clear rebuttal, Goldberg went on CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins to call the Secretary a liar.
Goldberg persisted in his narrative, claiming the details were indeed shared in the chat and were of such a sensitive nature that he chose not to publish them for fear of compromising American military personnel.
According to Goldberg, not only did no one in the group ever stop to question why this conversation was happening on Signal, but when Goldberg eventually exited the chat—his initials clearly showing as “J.G.”—no one even asked who he was or why he was there.
Kaitlan Collins:
“I want to start by getting your reaction to what we heard from Secretary Heggsett, who said that nobody was texting war plans. Given that you were privy to this group, Chad, is that how you saw it?”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“No, that’s a lie. He was texting war plans. He was texting attack plans. He detailed when targets were going to be targeted, how they were going to be targeted, who was at the targets, and when the next sequence of attacks was happening. I didn’t publish this, and I continue not to publish it because it felt confidential and too technical. Honestly, I worry that sharing that information in public could endanger American military personnel. But no, there were plans for the attack. They were texted before the attack.”Kaitlan Collins:
“There were things texted that you viewed as so sensitive you did not even publish them in your report today.”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“I made the decision that the technical aspects of this, including what weapons packages and the attack sequencing, were not necessarily in the public interest. What’s in the public interest is that they were running a war plan on a messaging app and didn’t even know who was invited into the conversation. I mean, it’s an obvious, ridiculous security breach. If you notice, he didn’t actually answer the question.”Kaitlan Collins:
“But his attempt at a denial also stood out to me, because no one that I talked to at the White House today argued this or tried to say these were misconstrued, or altered, or this is not real. I mean, the National Security Council confirmed the veracity of it.”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“The National Security Council—I asked various officials, including Pete Hegseth this morning, for a comment. The first question I had for everyone: Is this real? I wanted to make sure, obviously, before we go public, and say, “Are you sure this is not a disinformation campaign run by a foreign state, a nonstate actor of some sort, trying to target a journalist for reasons I couldn’t explain?” And they were like, “No, this is apparently a real channel.” I appreciate them telling the truth about that. And we published.”Kaitlan Collins:
“Did they seem alarmed when you reached out for comment?”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“Probably not the happiest day that they experienced in the White House so far, but they were professional about it.”Kaitlan Collins:
“I thought that as you were walking through when this began, you weren’t even sure if it was real yourself. You thought, “Maybe I’m being spun or conned, or something is happening here?”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“Until the day that I received the attack plan from Pete Hegseth at 11:44 a.m. on Saturday, March 15th, and then saw that the attack plan said that at 1:45 p.m. Eastern Time, the first bombs would be dropping in Yemen—until that moment, during that two-hour period between the text and the first bombs being dropped—I thought it was a hoax. I thought somebody was trying to entrap me.Again, could it have been a foreign intelligence service? Could it have been a gadfly organization that tries to entrap journalists, which we know happens? I didn’t know what it was or who it was. But what I did know was that the obvious answer—that this is a real conversation of the national security leadership of the United States—seemed improbable to me. Because why would they do it on Signal? Why would they do this on a messaging app? And why would they invite the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to watch?”
Kaitlan Collins:
“And how many people were on this chat?”Jeffrey Goldberg:
“Eighteen.”Kaitlan Collins:
“And did any of them, at any point when you were included in there, ever raise that question: “Why are we talking about this over Signal?””Jeffrey Goldberg:
“Nobody raised the question, “Why are we talking about this over Signal?” And nobody said, “Hey, who is J.G.?” Because you show up in a little bubble as your initials. No one at any point said, “Who’s J.G.?” When I withdrew from the group—you formally remove yourself—you hit a button, it says: “J.G. has removed himself from the group.” I assumed that somebody would say, “Hey, who just removed himself from the group?” Nothing.”
WATCH:
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