'There was no classified material discussed': White House slams The Atlantic, backs national security team amid Signalgate

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt continued to slam The Atlantic and back the Trump national security team after editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg published still more details of the Signal chat to which he was inadvertently added ahead of a US Armed Forces attack on the Houthis in the Red Sea. In her opening statement from the briefing room, Leavitt slammed Goldberg and The Atlantic as "failing" and blamed Democrats and media for focusing on what's now being called Signalgate.

"Here are the facts," Leavitt said at the outset. "The National Security Advisor has taken responsibility for this matter, and the National Security Council immediately said, alongside the White House Counsel's Office, that they are looking into how a reporter's number was inadvertently added to this messaging thread." A suit brought against the administration over the issue is being handled by Judge Boasberg.

"We have said all along that no classified material was sent on this messaging thread. There were no locations, no sources or methods revealed, and there were certainly no war plans discussed. The Atlantic has even admitted this themselves. Their release of these internal messages validates the truth which we have been saying all along," she continued.

"If this story proves anything, it proves that Democrats and their propagandists in the mainstream media know how to fabricate, orchestrate and disseminate a misinformation campaign quite well, and there's arguably no one in the media who loves manufacturing and pushing hoaxes more than Jeffrey Goldberg. Goldberg is an anti-Trump hater. He is a registered Democrat. Goldberg's wife is also a registered Democrat and a big Democrat donor who used to work under Hillary Clinton. This is the same Jeffrey Goldberg who infamously lied about weapons of mass destruction to get us into the Iraq War, which cost trillions of dollars and thousands of American soldiers." With that, she took questions.

The Monday release of text messages via the Signal app over Houthi attack plans was followed up on Wednesday by a further drop of messages. The Atlantic's editor-in-chief, who said he was inadvertently added to a Signal group chat with the Trump administration's national security team, was roundly derided by Trump officials after he released the first tranche of messages. In response, he released more.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, "Nobody was texting war plans" when he was asked about it. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said "no classified material" was shared on the Signal chat. Mike Waltz, who was named by Goldberg as the one who added him to the chat, told Laura Ingraham he'd never met the man. CIA Director John Ratcliffe said his communications on the app "were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information." President Donald Trump took aim at The Atlantic, saying it should have gone out of business, and further said that the information shared on the forthcoming Houthi attacks, which were carried out, were not classified information.

"We are not going to be lectured about national security and American troops by Democrats in the mainstream media who turned the other cheek when the Biden administration, because of their incompetence, left 13 service members dead in Afghanistan," Leavitt said amid questioning on this matter from reporters on Wednesday, "and not a single person in the previous administration was held accountable for that botched withdrawal. Joe Biden said, in fact, 'it was a great operation.' That is despicable. It's unacceptable to this President and the Secretary of Defense. The national security advisor has taken responsibility for this inadvertent number being added to the messaging thread, but above all, we take the lives of our troops, safety, security, prosperity around the globe with the utmost seriousness."

After reaching out to administration officials and getting no response on whether or not there were national security concerns over publishing the additional information, Goldberg published additional messages from the "Houthi PC small group" Signal chat. 

Per Goldberg:

"At 11:44 a.m. eastern time, Hegseth posted in the chat, in all caps, 'TEAM UPDATE:'

"The text beneath this began, 'TIME NOW (1144et): Weather is FAVORABLE. Just CONFIRMED w/CENTCOM we are a GO for mission launch.' Centcom, or Central Command, is the military’s combatant command for the Middle East. The Hegseth text continues:

'1215et: F-18s LAUNCH (1st strike package)'
'1345: ‘Trigger Based’ F-18 1st Strike Window Starts (Target Terrorist is @ his Known Location so SHOULD BE ON TIME – also, Strike Drones Launch (MQ-9s)'"

"The Hegseth text then continued:

'1410: More F-18s LAUNCH (2nd strike package)'
'1415: Strike Drones on Target (THIS IS WHEN THE FIRST BOMBS WILL DEFINITELY DROP, pending earlier ‘Trigger Based’ targets)'
'1536 F-18 2nd Strike Starts – also, first sea-based Tomahawks launched.”
'MORE TO FOLLOW (per timeline)'
'We are currently clean on OPSEC'—that is, operational security.
'Godspeed to our Warriors.'"

"At 1:48 p.m., Waltz sent the following text, containing real-time intelligence about conditions at an attack site, apparently in Sanaa: 'VP. Building collapsed. Had multiple positive ID. Pete, Kurilla, the IC, amazing job.'"

In the final question of the press conference, Leavitt was asked if there will "be a review about how often [national security officials] use Signal and if you could explain to us how they might be considering other applications to get away from something like this happening again?"

"Well, again," Leavitt replied, "first of all, Signal has been an approved app for government use. It's an encrypted app, and as I said, it's the most safe and efficient way of communicating, especially when people can't be in a SCIF or inside a room physically together. I think, as the President said yesterday, he wishes that everybody could be in the room, and it's our goal to ensure that everybody can be. But again, no classified information was discussed in this chat. Any time classified information is discussed amongst high-level officials across this administration, secure lines of communication are used."