âThe Breakfast Clubâ co-host DJ Envy on Tuesday challenged The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldbergâs decision to publish a piece detailing how he had been accidentally included in a group chat with cabinet officials on the Signal messaging platform.
Goldberg identified or inferred the presence of officials such as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and Vice President J.D. Vance in the group chat titled âHouthi PC small group,â where there was discussion of plans to bomb the Houthis, according to the editor-in-chiefâs piece published on Monday. Envy questioned Goldbergâs decision to publish the story on the âFront Page Newsâ segment of his show, arguing it could harm America.
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âYou know what I donât understand? I understand if you did get those texts, right, and you know those texts werenât supposed to be to you, why would you put it out there?â Envy asked. âLike, thatâs what I donât understand. Like, you are a journalist, but this is your country. And you know releasing some of that stuff can probably or might affect some of the things that happen. Why would you put that out there?â
Co-host Loren LoRosa responded by saying Goldberg published the piece because of how âbigâ of a story it was. Envy agreed, but suggested âit could affect militaryâ before LoRosa cut him off.
âNobody cares about that,â she said. âBecause you want to get â you have bylines, you want to get the clicks, you want to sensationalize.â
âDonât care about people, huh? They care more about likes and TikTok numbers?â Envy asked.
LoRosa doubled down on the fact that journalists care about getting reach on their articles.
âBut also, too, I think depending on where that journalist sits politically, like, itâs kind of like exposing how careless â or I think thatâs what they were trying to do â exposing how careless an administration could be, which is also dangerous,â she added. âSo, maybe thatâs their way of saying, âYo, if I care about my people, like yâall need to know. Yâall president and his administration are accidentally sending something thatâs serious.â
Goldberg did withhold some of the content of the conversation to preserve national security interests, he asserted in his piece.
âAt 11:44 a.m., the account labeled âPete Hegsethâ posted in Signal a âTEAM UPDATE.â I will not quote from this update, or from certain other subsequent texts,â he wrote of a March 15 message he said he received. âThe information contained in them, if they had been read by an adversary of the United States, could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel, particularly in the broader Middle East, Central Commandâs area of responsibility.â
However, he wrote that Hegsethâs message âcontained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.â
White House National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes told the Daily Caller Monday they believed the communications were authentic. He also said they were investigating how Goldbergâs number was added to the group chat.
âThe thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials,â Hughes said in a statement provided to the Caller. âThe ongoing success of the Houthi operation demonstrates that there were no threats to our service members or our national security.â
Journalist Mark Halperin said on âThe Morning Meetingâ Tuesday that he would have left the group chat had he been added to it.
âIf it was a private chain of proprietary information, Iâd get right off of it,â he asserted.
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