After a journalist was inadvertently included to a group conversation regarding airstrikes on Yemen, US President Donald Trump downplayed a growing crisis on Tuesday, claiming that any secret material was exchanged and protecting a senior adviser over the incident.
Trump stated that he would “look into” the usage of the Signal app and presented a united front at a meeting with US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who mistakenly included The Atlantic magazine’s Jeffrey Goldberg in the discussion.
As Democrats smelt blood for the first time since the Republican took office in January, Trump doubled down, calling Goldberg a “sleazebag” and said “nobody gives a damn” about the issue that has shaken Washington.
Journalist Goldberg said that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sent information in the Signal chat about targets, weapons and timing ahead of the strikes on March 15. Goldberg also revealed highly critical comments by top US officials about European allies.
“There was no classified information,” Trump told reporters when asked about the chat, saying that the commercial app Signal was used by “a lot of people in government.”
Waltz said US technical and legal experts were looking into the breach but insisted he had “never met, don’t know, never communicated” with the journalist.
“We are looking into him, reviewing how the heck he got in,” said Waltz when Trump asked him to comment during a meeting with new US ambassadors at the White House.
Content retrieved from: https://www.firstpost.com/world/trump-administration-downplay-scandal-as-witch-hunt-amid-leaked-chat-concerns-13874517.html.
