The Atlantic publishes additional trove of Signal messages with details of Yemen strike

Washington
CNN
 — 

The Atlantic on Wednesday published additional text messages from the Signal group chat of top Trump national security officials, underscoring a massive breach in operational security as specific sensitive information about the Houthi attack was shared in the chat before it was carried out.

President Donald Trump and his team have repeatedly sought to downplay the sensitivity of the information shared in the Signal group in the aftermath of The Atlantic’s bombshell story on Monday. While they denied there was a “war plan” shared, the text messages published Wednesday offer an extremely detailed description of the coming strike, including the airplanes and drones used.

The messages also rebut the claim from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other Trump administration officials that war plans were not discussed on the chain. In a message sent at 11:44 a.m. ET and published by The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg and Shane Harris, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shares operational details about the strikes: “Weather is FAVORABLE. Just CONFIRMED w/CENTCOM we are a GO for mission launch,” Hegseth wrote.

Top US officials have said the information shared in the text messages was not classified.

Hegseth goes on to share the plans in extraordinary detail, according to The Atlantic:

That information, according to The Atlantic, was received “two hours before the scheduled start of the bombing of Houthi positions.”

“If this information — particularly the exact times American aircraft were taking off for Yemen — had fallen into the wrong hands in that crucial two-hour period, American pilots and other American personnel could have been exposed to even greater danger than they ordinarily would face,” Goldberg and Harris wrote.

National security adviser Mike Waltz later texted to confirm that the target was in a building that collapsed and the strike was successful.

“The first target – their top missile guy – we had positive ID of him walking into his girlfriend’s building and it’s now collapsed,” Waltz wrote at 2 p.m. ET.

And later in the day, Hegseth confirmed to the group that more strikes were coming.

“Great job all. More strikes ongoing for hours tonight, and will provide full initial report tomorrow. But on time, on target, and good readouts so far,” he said.

Goldberg said on Wednesday the magazine decided to redact a sensitive piece of information out of their follow-up article.

“We did redact one piece of information because we felt, on our own, that we felt it was best to do. And the CIA asked us, but, you know, at a certain point, the administration is saying that there’s nothing classified or secret or sensitive in these so at a certain point, I just felt, you know, let our readers decide for themselves,” he said on MSNBC of the decision to publish the rest of the information.

Moments after The Atlantic published the text messages, the White House continued to push back and seek to discredit Goldberg’s reporting, though the National Security Council has verified the authenticity of the text thread.

“The Atlantic has conceded: these were NOT ‘war plans.’ This entire story was another hoax written by a Trump-hater who is well-known for his sensationalist spin,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a post to social media.

Leavitt is also pushing back against concerns that Steve Witkoff, the president’s special envoy for the Middle East, who was on the group chat, was receiving the texts while in Moscow. Witkoff, she said, “was provided a secure line of communication by the U.S. Government, and it was the only phone he had in his possession while in Moscow,” going on to shift blame to the media.

Goldberg criticized Leavitt’s response to the news during his MSNBC appearance and said “she’s just playing some sort of weird semantic game.”

This story has been updated with additional developments.