The US Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, shared detailed information about future American strikes in Yemen on March 15 in a private Signal chat group that included his wife, brother, and personal lawyer,
The information shared by Pete Hegseth on the Signal chat referred to the flight times for F/A-18 Hornet aircraft targeting Houthi rebels in Yemen, writes The New York Times (NYT), citing four sources familiar with the situation.
Essentially, it was the same attack plans he had shared on a separate Signal chat on the same day, which mistakenly included the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic publication.
Hegseth's wife, Jennifer, a former producer at Fox News, is not an employee of the Department of Defense, but she has traveled abroad with him, leading to criticism for accompanying her husband to sensitive meetings with foreign leaders.
Hegseth's brother, Phil, and Tim Parlatore, who continues to be his personal lawyer, both have jobs at the Pentagon, but it is unclear why they should know about future military strikes against the Houthi movement in Yemen.
The existence - previously unknown - of a second Signal chat in which the Pentagon chief shared highly sensitive military information is the latest in a series of events that have called into question his management and judgment in one of the most sensitive positions in the administration, notes NYT.
The group was created by the Pentagon chief himself
Unlike the chat where The Atlantic journalist was inadvertently included, this second chat group was created by Pete Hegseth himself. The group included his wife and about 12 other individuals from his personal and professional circle and was created in January, before his confirmation as defense secretary, named "Defense | Team Huddle."
Hegseth used his private phone, not the government one, to access the Signal chat.
The fact that after Hegseth's confirmation, his wife, brother, and personal lawyer continued to be included in this chat group - none of them seemingly having any reason to be informed about the operational details of a military operation while it was ongoing - will surely raise other questions about the Pentagon chief's adherence to security protocols, comments The New York Times.
The chat group revealed by The Atlantic in March was created by Mike Waltz, President Trump's national security adviser, so that the highest officials in national security within the executive branch, such as the vice president, the director of national intelligence, and Hegseth, could coordinate with each other and their deputies before US attacks.
Hegseth created the separate Signal group, initially as a forum for discussing routine administrative or planning information, said two people familiar with the chat. They said Hegseth usually did not use the chat to discuss sensitive military operations and did not include other cabinet-level officials.
Who was in the chat group
Hegseth shared information about the Yemen strikes in the "Defense | Team Huddle" chat group at about the same time he presented the same details in the other Signal chat group, which included senior American officials and The Atlantic journalist, according to NYT sources.
After The Atlantic revealed that Hegseth used Waltz's Signal group to communicate details about strikes as they were launched, the Trump administration stated that no "war plans" or classified information were shared, a claim viewed with significant skepticism by national security experts.
In the case of Hegseth's Signal group, an American official declined to comment on whether the Pentagon chief shared detailed target information, but maintained that there was no breach of national security.
The "Defense/Team Huddle" chat included until recently about a dozen top advisers of Hegseth, including Joe Kasper, his chief of staff, and Sean Parnell, the Pentagon spokesperson.
Also in that group were two senior advisers of Hegseth - Dan Caldwell and Darin Selnick - who were recently accused of unauthorized information leaks and were fired. Caldwell and Selnick are among the three former senior Pentagon officials who proclaimed their innocence in a public statement on Saturday in response to the information leak investigation that led to their dismissal.
Waltz's Signal chat for high-ranking administration officials has been criticized for sharing details of a military operation on an encrypted but unclassified app. However, some participants in Hegseth's chat group were not officials who needed real-time information about the operation details.
Wife, brother, and lawyer
Jennifer Hegseth drew attention for the access her husband granted her. Hegseth brought her to two meetings with foreign military counterparts in February and early March, during which sensitive information was discussed, as reported by The Wall Street Journal.
As for Parlatore, who has been Hegseth's personal lawyer for the past eight years, he was appointed as a Marine Corps Judge Advocate General with the rank of commander about a week before the Yemen attacks began.
Pete Hegseth's brother, Phil, works at the Pentagon as a liaison officer with the Department of Homeland Security and holds the rank of senior adviser to the defense secretary.
A person familiar with the chat said Hegseth's aides warned him a day or two before the Yemen attacks not to discuss such sensitive operational details in his Signal chat group, which, although encrypted, is not considered as secure as the government channels typically used for discussing highly sensitive war planning and operations.
It was not clear how Pete Hegseth responded to these warnings, a veteran of the military and former Fox News presenter who had never held a high-level government position before his confirmation in January.
Several of the staff members encouraged Hegseth to move work-related matters from the "Defense | Team Huddle" chat to his government phone, but Hegseth never made the transfer, according to some of the chat's informants.
Investigation and dismissals at the Pentagon
The Pentagon's acting inspector general announced earlier this month that he would investigate Hegseth's disclosures about the Yemen strike on the Signal chat that included top Trump advisers. "The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the defense secretary and another Pentagon employee complied with policies and procedures regarding the use of a commercial messaging app for official business," said acting inspector general Steven Stebbins in a notification letter to Hegseth.
It is not clear, notes NYT, if Stebbins' investigation uncovered the Signal chat that included Hegseth's wife and other advisers.
Stebbins initiated the checks in response to a bipartisan request from Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and the committee's senior Democrat, Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island.
Beyond the Signal discussion controversy, Hegseth's office has been shaken by the abrupt firings of Caldwell, Selnick, and Colin Carroll, all top advisers to the defense secretary. They were escorted out of the Pentagon last week after being accused of leaking sensitive information.
The dismissals and the turmoil surrounding the inspector general's investigation have heightened tensions and sparked discussions about more resignations, according to current and former defense officials. Among those considering leaving is Kasper, Hegseth's chief of staff, who helped lead the investigation into the information leaks that led to the dismissal of his colleagues but was not involved in any wrongdoing, according to senior defense officials.