WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth created another Signal messaging chat that included his wife and brother where he shared the same details of a March military airstrike against Yemen’s Houthi militants that were sent in another chain with top Trump administration leaders, The New York Times reported.
A person familiar with the contents and those who received the messages, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, confirmed the second chat to The Associated Press.
The second chat on Signal — which is a commercially available app not authorized to be used to communicate sensitive or classified national defense information — included 13 people, the person said. They also confirmed the chat was dubbed “Defense ‘ Team Huddle.”
The New York Times reported that group included Hegseth’s wife, Jennifer, a former Fox News producer, and his brother Phil Hegseth, who was hired at the Pentagon as a Department of Homeland Security liaison and senior adviser. Both have been traveling with the defense secretary and attending high-level meetings.
The revelation of the additional chat group is sure to bring fresh criticism against Hegseth and the wider Trump administration after it has failed to take action so far against top national security officials who discussed plans for a military strike in Signal.
The first chat, set up by national security adviser Mike Waltz, included a number of Cabinet members and came to light because Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, was added to the group.
The contents of the chat, which The Atlantic published, shows that Hegseth listed weapons systems and a timeline for the attack on Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen last month.
