US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth
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Daniel Keane1 minute ago
US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth created another Signal messaging chat that included his wife and brother where he shared details of a military strike against Yemen’s Houthi militants, according to a report.
The New York Times reported that the messages were similar to those sent in another chain with top Trump administration leaders in March.
The second chat on Signal — which is a commercially available app not authorised to be used to communicate sensitive or classified national defence information — included 13 people, the person said.
A source confirmed to the Associated Press that the chat was dubbed “Defense ' Team Huddle.”
The New York Times reported that the group included Hegseth’s wife, Jennifer, who is a former Fox News producer, and his brother Phil Hegseth, who was hired at the Pentagon as a Department of Homeland Security liaison and senior adviser.
Both have traveled with the defence secretary and attended high-level meetings.
The White House on Sunday dismissed the report as a “non-story”.
Anna Kelly, White House deputy press secretary, said: “No matter how many times the legacy media tries to resurrect the same non-story, they can’t change the fact that no classified information was shared.
“Recently-fired ‘leakers’ are continuing to misrepresent the truth to soothe their shattered egos and undermine the President’s agenda, but the administration will continue to hold them accountable.”
President Donald Trump was accused of failing to act last month after The Atlantic published details of an extraordinary security breach that saw the magazine’s editor added to a Signal group chat with senior officials to discuss a military strike on Yemen.
The first chat, set up by national security adviser Mike Waltz, included a number of Cabinet members and came to light because Jeffrey Goldberg, the magazine’s editor-in-chief, was added to the group.
The contents of that chat, which The Atlantic published, show that Hegseth listed weapons systems and a timeline for the attack on Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen last month.
“The details keep coming out. We keep learning how Pete Hegseth put lives at risk. But Trump is still too weak to fire him,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer posted on X. “Pete Hegseth must be fired.”
The latest revelation comes days after Dan Caldwell, one of Hegseth's leading advisers, was escorted from the Pentagon after being identified during an investigation into leaks at the Department of Defence.
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Although Caldwell is not as well known as other senior Pentagon officials, he has played a critical role for Hegseth and was named as the Pentagon's point person by the Secretary in the first Signal chat.
"We are incredibly disappointed by the manner in which our service at the Department of Defence ended," Caldwell posted on X on Saturday. "Unnamed Pentagon officials have slandered our character with baseless attacks on our way out the door."
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