Politics

JUST IN: Investigation Reveals How The Atlantic Accessed Trump Admin Group Chat

Published

5 days ago

April 7, 2025

A White House investigation has uncovered how a liberal reporter with The Atlantic was able to infiltrate a national security group chat between some of the Trump administration’s biggest players last month as they gamed out a bombing campaign against Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Jeffrey Goldberg, the outlet’s editor-in-chief, sent shockwaves through Washington, D.C. when he published excerpts of a Signal conversation between Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and others as they relayed minute-by-minute updates about the attack. It was soon revealed that Waltz had erred in sending an invitation to Goldberg, who said he first thought the group chat was a “joke” being played on him.

According to sources close to the probe, Waltz’s mistake was made when he accepted a contacts update prompted by his government-issued iPhone. A “forensic review” conducted shows that Goldberg’s number had been saved in a contact card created for former Trump spokesman Brian Hughes, who had been contacted by Goldberg about a forthcoming story critical of President Donald Trump’s past comments about service members wounded in action.

Hughes copied the entirety of Goldberg’s email about his October 22nd, 2024 story and pasted it into another email sent to Waltz, whom he asked to connect with the reporter so he could be briefed about the contents of his story.

Instead, Waltz erroneously saved Goldberg’s phone number — which was contained in his signature at the bottom of the copied email message — under a contact card that his phone suggested be labeled as ‘Hughes.’

Insiders say that Waltz fell victim to an algorithmic feature of new iPhones, which prompts users to save the contact information for new individuals by making a best guess about whom they may be and how to reach them. In the case of Hughes’ email, Goldberg’s phone appeared to try and predict that he was communicating with the Atlantic reporter based on the email signature belonging to Goldberg.

Within the chat, titled “Houthi PC small group,” Goldberg went unnoticed as his addition was labeled under Hughes, now the national security spokesman to Waltz.

The discovery, in some ways, vindicates Waltz’s initial assertion that his phone somehow “sucked” Goldberg’s number into his contacts. The national security advisor appeared on CNN in the subsequent days, expressing genuine disbelief at how the situation unfolded.

Shortly after the news first broke, President Trump reportedly gave serious consideration to firing Waltz, three sources told the Daily Mail, but decided against doing so because he did not want The Atlantic to appear as if its reporting was leading to personnel changes in the administration. Instead, he said in public remarks that Waltz had learned from “his mistake.”

The use of Signal, an encrypted chat that is not altogether secure for U.S. intelligence communications, was adopted by the Biden-Harris administration, according to transition documents revealed during the fallout. The Trump team has said that it continued to encourage the use of the preinstalled app on government devices while employees transition to a new, more secure platform.