By Tara Copp, Associated Press
Washington (AP) – The Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, created another signal messaging cat which included his wife and brother where he shared similar details on a March military air strike against Yemen Houthi activists who were sent to another channel with the best leaders of Trump administration, reported the New York Times.
A person familiar with the content and those who received the messages, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues, confirmed the second cat with the Associated Press.
The second cat on signal – which is an application available in the trade which is not allowed to be used to communicate sensitive or classified information on national defense – included 13 people, said the person. The person also confirmed that the cat had been nicknamed “Defense” Team Huddle “.
The New York Times reported that the group included the wife of Hegseth, Jennifer, who is a former producer of Fox News, and his brother Phil Heg Heg Heg, who was hired in the Pentagon as a department of interior security and senior advisor. The two traveled with the defense secretary and attended high -level meetings.
The White House and the Pentagon said late Sunday Sunday that former dissatisfied employees were repaired for false complaints.
“Regardless of the number of times the inherited media try to resuscitate the same non-history, they cannot change the fact that no classified information has been shared,” said Anna Kelly, assistant press secretary. “The recently drawn” leaks “continue to distort the truth to appease their broken Egos and undermine the president’s agenda, but the administration will continue to keep them responsible.”
Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell added in an article on X on Sunday late Sunday that the report “was only based on the words of the people who were dismissed this week and seem to have a reason to sabotage the secretary and the president’s agenda. There was no classified information in a reported cat, regardless of the ways they try to write history.”
The revelation of the additional discussion group has brought new calls to HEGSETH to be ousted while the administration of President Donald Trump has faced criticism for having omitted to act so far against the main national security officials who have discussed the plans of the military signal strike.
“The details continue to get out. We continue to learn how Pete Hegseth has put lives in danger. But Trump is still too weak to dismiss him,” said the Democrat chief of the Senate, Chuck Schumer, “Pete Hegseth must be dismissed.”
The first cat, created by the national security advisor Mike Waltz, included a number of members of the cabinet and was revealed because Jeffrey Goldberg, editor -in -chief of the Atlantic, was added to the group.
The content of this cat, which the Atlantic has published, shows that Hegseth listed weapons systems and a calendar for the attack on the Houthis supported by Iran in Yemen last month.
Hegseth previously argued that no classified information or war plans had been shared in the cat with the journalist.
The Times reported on Sunday that the second cat had the same hours of launching the war plane as the first cat included. Several former and current have declared that the sharing of these operational details before a strike was certainly classified and that their release could have put pilots in danger.
The use by Hegseth of the signal and the sharing of these plans are the subject of an investigation by the interim Inspector General of the Ministry of Defense. He intervened at the request of the management of the senatorial committee of armed services – Republican president Roger Wicker of Mississippi and the Democratic Member of ranking Jack Reed of Rhode Island.
Reed urged the Pentagon guard dog on Sunday evening to also probe the second reported cat, saying that Hegseth “must immediately explain why he would have sent classified information that could endanger the life of American services”.
“I have serious concerns about the capacity of the Hegseth secretary to maintain the confidence of the American soldiers and the commander-in-chief,” he added.
New revelations occur during new Pentagon disorders. Four officials of the Hegseth’s inner circle left last week while the Pentagon conducts a general survey for information leaks.
Dan Caldwell, a HegSeth assistant; Colin Carroll, chief of staff of the Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg; And Darin Selnick, the deputy chief of staff of Hegseth, were escorted from the Pentagon.
While the three had initially been put on leave while waiting for the investigation, a joint declaration shared by Caldwell on X on Saturday said that the three “had still not been informed of which we were the subject of an investigation, if there was always an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation into the ‘leak’ ‘to start.”
Caldwell was the staff member appointed as the HegSeth point person in the Signal Chat with Trump’s cabinet.
Former Pentagon spokesperson John Ulyot also announced that he is resigning last week, unrelated to leaks. The Pentagon said, however, that Ulyot had been invited to resign.
The writer AP Michelle L. Price in Washington contributed to this report.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
