Trump Administration’s Sends the Wrong Signal on National Security
The Trump administration was caught with its pants down when it was revealed that they had invited a journalist to a chat group about military action against the Houthi rebels. The chat which took place on the Signal app shocked experts and politicians on both sides of the aisle as to why a sensitive discussion was taking place on an app instead of a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) which is designed for this purpose. Signal is an end-to-end encrypted app with millions of users but is not vetted for classified information as was discussed in the now public chat.
Rather than just admit that it was a mistake to invite the journalist, The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg into that chat the administration has thrown up a myriad of excuses from Goldberg hacking the app to that there were no war plans discussed. Goldberg, who is no fan of Trump actually held back some of the sensitive information at first but after being attacked by Trump and others who were in the chat (Trump wasn’t) The Atlantic has published the texts.
One such text came from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth who discussed the DOD’s attack plan including the time the attacks would begin.
“Godspeed to our Warriors,” he wrote.
“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)”
“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”
The group was created by National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and included Hegseth, Vice-President J.D. Vance, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and many other administration officials. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was apparently not included despite the fact this was a discussion of a military operation.
There have been security breaches in previous administrations-think of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s email server which she didn’t readily come clean on either but Trump’s attack on Goldberg has backfired and made it appear that he is more interested in covering up the error rather than dealing with it head-on and finding out who was responsible for the security breach.
The media and Trump have a fractious relationship-especially since he was reelected and pointing fingers at journalists every time something goes wrong sends the wrong message to Americans who want answers and not excuses.
Don Irvine
Donald Irvine is the chairman of of Accuracy in Academia (AIA), a non-profit research group reporting on bias in education. Irvine follows his father’s legacy, Reed Irvine, to critically analyze the liberal media’s bias and brings over thirty years of media analysis experience. He has published countless blog posts and articles on media bias, in context of current events, and he has been interviewed by many news media outlets during his professional career. He currently hosts a livestream weekly show on AIA’s Facebook page which discusses current events.
Irvine graduated from the University of Maryland and rose up the ranks to become chairman of Accuracy in Media until his transition to AIA.
He resides in the suburbs around the nation’s capital and is a proud father and grandfather.
