What were the war plans White House mistakenly shared with The Atlantic journalist?

Democratic lawmakers hit out at the Trump administration for the misstep, saying it was a breach of US national security and a violation of law that must be investigated by Congress.

National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes said the chat group appeared to be authentic.

Accounts that appeared to represent Vice President JD Vance, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, CIA director John Ratcliffe, director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, treasury secretary Scott Bessent, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, and senior National Security Council officials were assembled in the chat group, Jeffrey Goldberg wrote.

What White House texted to journalist

• In a report on Monday, Jeffrey Goldberg said he was unexpectedly invited on March 13 to an encrypted chat group on the Signal messaging app called the “Houthi PC small group”.
• In the group, national security adviser Mike Waltz tasked his deputy Alex Wong with setting up a “tiger team” to coordinate US action against the Houthis.
• Goldberg claimed that hours before those military strikes against Yemen’s Houthis on March 15, defence secretary Pete Hegseth posted operational details about the plan in the messaging group, “including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing”.
• His report omitted the details, but Goldberg termed it a “shockingly reckless” use of a Signal chat.
• Hegseth denied sharing war plans in the group chat. “Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that,” Hegseth told reporters while on an official trip to Hawaii on Monday.
• Goldberg responded to Hegseth’s denial in an interview on CNN late on Monday by saying, “No, that’s a lie. He was texting war plans.”
• According to screenshots of the chat reported by The Atlantic, officials in the group debated whether the US should carry out the strikes, and at one point Vance appeared to question whether US allies in Europe, more exposed to shipping disruption in the region, deserved US help.
• “@PeteHegseth if you think we should do it let’s go,” a person identified as Vance wrote. “I just hate bailing Europe out again,” the person wrote, adding: “Let’s just make sure our messaging is tight here.”
• A person identified as Hegseth replied: “VP: I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC.”
• The Atlantic reported that the person identified as Vance also raised concerns about the timing of the strikes and said there was a strong argument in favour of delaying them by a month.
• “I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now. There’s a further risk that we see a moderate to severe spike in oil prices,” the account wrote, before saying he was willing to support the group’s consensus.

What Donald Trump said

President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House that he was unaware of the incident. “I don’t know anything about it. I’m not a big fan of The Atlantic,” Trump said.

A White House official said later that an investigation was underway and Trump had been briefed on it.

(With inputs from agencies)