Pentagon’s Acting Inspector General to Examine Pete Hegseth’s Use of Signal for Houthi Airstrike Planning | US News

The acting inspector general of the Pentagon announced plans to investigate Pete Hegseth’s use of the Signal messaging application after it was reported that the U.S. Secretary of Defense utilized it to discuss airstrike strategies.

This review will also assess the usage of the publicly available encrypted app by other defense officials, which is not designed for handling classified information and is not integrated into the secure network of the U.S. government.

Recently, The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffery Goldberg, revealed that he was included in a group chat on the platform by National Security Adviser Mike Waltz titled “Houthi PC small group”, where discussions regarding a planned strike on the Yemeni militants took place.

Read more: What was discussed in Trump officials’ group chat

The journalist reported that Mr. Hegseth shared operational specifics of the plan, which included weapon packages, targets, and timing, in the group chat that featured Vice President JD Vance and other officials.

The defense secretary initially claimed to reporters that no one had sent war plans via text, while U.S. President Donald Trump stated that the transmission of sensitive plans was “the only glitch in two months” and considered it a non-issue.

On Thursday, Acting Inspector General Steven Stebbins informed Mr. Hegseth through a notification letter that he would be examining the usage of Signal by the Secretary of Defense and other defense officials.

“The aim of this evaluation is to ascertain the degree to which the Secretary of Defense and other DoD [Department of Defense] personnel adhered to DoD policies and procedures concerning the employment of a commercial messaging application for official business,” he stated.

“We will also investigate compliance with classification and records retention standards.”

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The review was initiated at the request of Republican Senator Roger Wicker and Democratic Senator Jack Reed, the chairman and a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, respectively.

Mr. Trump faced calls to dismiss Mr. Hegseth following reports from The Atlantic. On Monday, Sky’s U.S. partner network NBC News reported that White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt mentioned that the “case has been closed here.”