U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Illinois, references text messages from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during an annual global threat assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence hearing inadvertently targeted top aides, including Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, in a high-level Trump administration Signals group chat that discussed plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen. (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth violated official policy when he used the publicly available Signal app to send messages from his personal cellphone about military plans, including impending bombings in Yemen, according to a report released Thursday by the Pentagon’s watchdog agency.
The Inspector General of the Department of Defense 84-page report concluded that Hegseth transmitted information about the “times of attacks by manned U.S. aircraft over enemy territory over an unauthorized, insecure network approximately 2 to 4 hours before these attacks were carried out.”
“Although the Secretary wrote in his July 25 statement to the DoD OIG that ‘there were no details that would endanger our troops or the mission,’ if this information had fallen into the hands of U.S. adversaries, Houthi forces may have been able to take action against U.S. forces or reposition personnel and assets to avoid planned U.S. attacks,” the report said. “Even if these events ultimately did not occur, the Secretary’s actions posed operational security risks that could have resulted in failures in U.S. mission objectives and potential harm to U.S. pilots.”
Members of Congress from both political parties requested The Defense Department’s inspector general is investigating Hegseth’s operate of Signal after a journalist at The Atlantic did so accidentally added to a group chat by national security officials planning the bombing in Yemen. Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg later published a series of stories Details of the news.
Acting Inspector General of the Department of Defense Steven A. Stebbins published a memo In April he announced that he had opened an investigation into the matter.
Republicans want more Pentagon technology, Democrats want Hegseth gone
Congressional reactions to the report were mixed: Republicans suggested more technology was needed for the Pentagon, while Democrats called for Hegseth to resign.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., issued a statement saying the report shows Hegseth “acted within his authority to share the information in question with other Cabinet-level officials.”
“I also recognize that our leaders need more tools to communicate sensitive information in real time and in diverse environments,” Wicker added. “I think we still have some work to do to provide our national security leaders with these tools.”
Jack Reed, DR.I., ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a statement that the report confirms “that Secretary Hegseth has violated military regulations and continues to show reckless disregard for the safety of American soldiers.”
“For months, Secretary Hegseth has attempted to mislead Congress and the American people by repeatedly claiming this is not classified information,” Reed said. “The Inspector General has now finally cast doubt on these false assurances.”
Reed added that Hegseth “should explain himself to Congress, the public and the soldiers he leads. The men and women of our armed forces deserve leadership to whom they can trust their lives.”
Hegseth refuses to give investigators a cell phone
The inspector general’s report said Hegseth refused to participate in an interview with Defense Department regulators, refused to turn over his personal cellphone to investigators and failed to retain some of the messages in accordance with federal records requirements.
Officials working for Hegseth shared copies of the Signal chat with the inspector general, but they were incomplete because the app’s auto-delete feature was enabled at the time. Signal users can set this for different lengths of time or turn it off completely.
According to the report, Hegseth was at the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) at his home on the morning and early afternoon of March 15 to monitor “the operation against the Houthis.”
Two aides who were with Hegseth at the time told investigators that he used “secure, secret” systems to communicate with U.S. Central Command officials “while planning and executing the attacks against Houthi targets that day and reviewing information related to the attacks.”
“In the SCIF, the Secretary had access to multiple secure means of communication that enabled him to provide necessary operational details and updates to government officials outside of the Department of Defense in the Signals group chat,” the report said.
The group chat about the Yemen bombing, which a journalist accidentally joined, was not the only one Hegseth used to communicate about official Pentagon business from his personal phone.
Eight officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Office of the Chief Information Officer told investigators that Hegseth “created multiple Signal group chats in which the secretary and others discussed purportedly official DoD business and nonpublic information.”
“One of the officials we spoke with indicated that the minister had disclosed the same sensitive operational information about the Houthi attack plans in the ‘Defense Team Huddle’ group chat,” the report said, later adding that Hegseth refused to provide information on that chat.
The inspector general chose not to make recommendations about Signal’s operate in the report because “data management issues arising from the use of Signal and other commercially available messaging applications represent a DoD-wide problem.”
A previous inspector general report also called on the department to “improve training of senior DoD officials to comply with data retention laws and policies.”
Rogers, of Alabama, says the mission is not at risk
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Ala., wrote in a statement that it is “important to remember that this was a successful operation that eliminated a dangerous target without causing harm to U.S. troops. It is clear that the discussion about Signal did not jeopardize the mission.”
“During recent administrations, the use of Signal for communications between government officials has increased, so I appreciate the IG’s extensive work in developing recommendations to improve and secure communications,” Rogers said. “I encourage the administration to follow these recommendations and look forward to discussions with the Pentagon about how to implement them.”
House Defense Committee member Adam Smith, D-Wash., called the report “a damning assessment of an incompetent defense secretary who is profoundly incapable of doing his job and who clearly has no respect or understanding of what is needed to protect our service members.”
“It confirms appalling policy violations – specifically, that the secretary used unsecured platforms to boast about sensitive operational details that could have jeopardized both the mission and, more importantly, the lives of American soldiers tasked with carrying out Operation Rough Rider,” Smith said.
“A criminal offense for anyone else in the Ministry of Defense”
Rep. Chris Coons, D-Del., ranking member of the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, said in a statement that the report “concluded that Secretary Hegseth violated Department of Defense procedures and endangered the lives of service members through his reckless handling of sensitive information.”
“In March, I led a group of senators who urged the Trump administration to investigate this blatant misconduct. Any military member who acted with such disregard for our national security would at least be fired,” Coons said. “Our nation’s most senior defense official should not be held to lower standards than the men and women he oversees. For the good of our nation, I once again call on Secretary Hegseth to resign.”
Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in a statement that the report “confirms what I feared when this signals thread was published: We are fortunate that the mission was not compromised and service members were not unnecessarily put at risk thanks to Secretary Hegseth’s reckless handling of classified information.”
“Pete Hegseth’s conduct and lack of judgment would be a criminal offense for anyone else in the Department of Defense,” Himes said. “Furthermore, his refusal to participate in an interview with the inspector general or submit his device for review is another example of his failure to accept responsibility for his actions.”
