The Scandal Will Also Be in How They Brush It Aside
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
If a scandal comes to light and no one does anything about it—is it a real scandal?
I suppose we’ll find out.
Don’t get me wrong: The fact that the most senior national security officials in the United States government hopped on to a commercially available messaging app to discuss details of a forthcoming U.S. military operation is a scandal.
Indeed, their behavior suggests that these officials have been doing this routinely to discuss all manner of issues, including the most highly classified ones. A failure to observe government rules and laws has probably been business as usual for the Trump administration. In other words, a further and more widespread scandal very likely lurks beneath the surface.
A basic investigation would uncover this. But the shockingly irresponsible, cavalierly reckless, and likely illegal conduct of top government officials should lead to more than that. It should be grounds for resignation and perhaps prosecution. It should lead to widespread outrage. It should result in real demands for accountability, not just from the opposition but from the president’s own party. There should be consequences.
I suspect there won’t be.
I hope I’m wrong in saying that. I hope I’m wrong in sensing, as I write this morning, that the outrage is already fading. I hope I’m wrong in believing it’s unlikely there will be serious consequences, and that the memory of this scandal will soon fade away. Our old friend, Marc Caputo, reports this morning that barely anyone inside the Trump orbit believes National Security adviser Mike Waltz, who invited the Atlantic ’s Jeffrey Goldberg to the chat, will be forced out.
“We don’t care what the media says,” a Trump adviser told Marc. “We can easily handle what would kill any other administration. This will blow over.”
Of course, we’ll make fun for a while of the fact that the “Houthi PC small group” mistakenly invited a reporter to join its text chain, and of the secretary of defense for boasting that the administration was “currently clean on OPSEC,” or operational security. We’ll mock the sophomoric exchanges and the clenched fist and flexed biceps emojis on the text chain. We’ll ridicule yesterday’s White House statement claiming that “this thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials.”
Perhaps we’ll even remember this paragraph from Goldberg’s piece:
I will not quote from this update, or from certain other subsequent texts. The 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 Command’s area of responsibility. What I will say, in order to illustrate the shocking recklessness of this Signal conversation, is that the Hegseth post contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.
Whatever the comical absurdity of some of the surrounding circumstances, this is truly shocking.
And yet, in the era of Trump, will it matter?
In another era, we would expect announcements today that the Justice Department and the FBI and the intelligence community will be investigating the conduct of the officials and the possibility of foreign adversaries obtaining sensitive information.
In another era, the White House would be assuring the media of its cooperation in that investigation. Indeed, in another era, to ensure that the investigation wouldn’t be politically compromised, a special counsel would soon be appointed.
Does anyone expect that from Pam Bondi and Kash Patel and Tulsi Gabbard and Donald Trump?
In fact, this prospect seems so unrealistic that it’s barely been raised by commentators in the last 24 hours—even though it’s been the historical norm.
In another era, Congress would be planning extensive and probing hearings. All it would take would be a handful of Republican senators and House members breaking from the administration and their party to support Congress doing its duty. This prospect isn’t quite as unrealistic as the Trump administration launching a serious internal investigation into what happened. But for now at least, it seems pretty unrealistic.
So I fear this scandalous demonstration by senior Trump officials of irresponsibility and illegality will be a scandal without real consequences.
After all, irresponsibility and illegality is what we (writ large) voted for. As we learned in some detail yesterday, it’s what we’ve got. If we don’t change course, it’s what we’ll have for another nearly four years—at least.
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Every time I think the hypocrisy of the left can't surprise me anymore one of them comes along and says hold my beer.
If this happened, and probably did under the Biden admin, the reporter would simply say "whoops. Better drop me from this text chain. What PAC do you me to donate to?" Americans would never hear of it.
But the idea that the administration that worked to censor media that accurately reported news and had dozens of intelligence officials lie to help the censorship push, that covered up the lab leak in Wuhan that killed millions and demonized anyone who tried to report it and made no one take any accountability over the disastrous Afghan withdrawal would ever, ever appoint a special counsel to look into text messages is simply preposterous.
”simply preposterous. “
anyone defending these mentally deficient incompetent antithesis of the departments they “lead”, is
The Obama administration outed the head of the CIA in Afghanistan in a press release putting him and everyone he had contact with at risk and there wasn't this much outrage, and how long was it after Biden told the world that the Seals had taken down Bin Laden that their helicopter was targeted with a RPG? Crickets from the left, yet here nobody was placed at risk and they are hair on fire, hypocrites doesn't even cover it.
but, but, but, what about ...
That's all they got. They don't even have any proof that this kind of shit happened under Obama's or Biden's watch
I'm watching the hearings now. the maga sycophants have gone off topic and are talking about everything but the security breach hearing topic, like they do here ...
Any and EVERYONE should be outraged at this. Wrong is wrong! Stop with the attempt at comparing this to anything. They FCKD UP, period. If Goldberg wasn’t an American patriot, many of our servicemen could have been injured or killed. How you attempt a what aboutism with this is truly embarrassing
"A list that was meant to help journalists report on President Obama's trip to Afghanistan on Sunday has instead created an awkward and potentially damaging situation. That's because it mistakenly included the name of the CIA station chief in Kabul, the agency's top official there.
It's customary for the White House Press Office to distribute lists with the official titles and full names of senior officials who come into contact with the president. But the report of diplomatic and military officials who attended a briefing with Obama at Bagram air base Sunday included one that stuck out: "Chief of Station," along with a name.
When it realized the error, the White House issued a new list — but by then, the original had been circulated to foreign and domestic news agencies. The information was included in a pool report that was emailed to thousands of recipients Sunday night."
"During a press conference on Washington Thursday, family and advocates for the fallen troops called into question the rules of engagement that they say prohibited their sons from being able to return fire, and the White House's decision to announce shortly after the killing of Osama bin Laden that SEAL Team 6 was responsible for the raid.
"In releasing their identity, they put a target on their backs," said Doug Hamburger, whose son, Army Staff Sgt. Patrick Hamburger, served among the helicopter's crew."
"In all, 17 members of the SEAL Team 6 counterterrorist force were on board the CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter, along with its Army National Guard aircrew, several support personnel and seven Afghan commandos. In all 38 troops died after the helicopter was shot down by what a review determined to be a Taliban RPG over Wardak Province, Afghanistan, on Aug. 6, 2011."
Obama fucked up
All the Republicans on that committee want to talk about is illegal migrants.
Absolute fucking bullshit, explain how our "servicemen" could have been injured? this wasn't a fucking raid it was an aerial attack. explain how a group of goat herders are going to shoot down aircraft.
maga may be still outraged about that, but that makes this breach okay ...
..............and the threat of unbridled entry and how it is a real threat to national security since for the last four years, we took their word for why they came. Not smart.
I know, right? Take. Fingers. Off. Key. Board.
too late
holy fucking shit, Jim! That's the best you can do? This isn't about immigrants. It's about a colossal fuck-up in the White House....WHICH YOU FUCKING VOTED FOR!!!
Were you ever in teh military? If so, did you want the enemy to know when you were coming and with what weapons? Shit! I didn't even serve in combat but even I knew I didn't want the enemy to know which direction I was coming from.
I know this is getting a ticket because I'm sure I offended some body. I've got the spine to take it
Can you point out where anyone said this breach is okay? anywhere? what is being pointed out is the abject hypocrisy of the hair on fire left who ignored this type of breach when peoples lives were actually put at risk because it was a democrat that did it.
What fuck up would that be that the White House fucked up. Be specific........................
OMG I really have to spell this out for you. What is the topic of this seed? The White House Cabinet members are all part of the White House Administration. trmp hand picked this colossal bunch of fuck ups to run this country. HE has the ultimate responsibility and the blame
Progressives are essentially arguing that though they think Jeffrey Dahmer should not have been punished for mass murder, someone who commits manslaughter should get hung, drawn and quartered.
So we should let our enemies know who, what, where, when, and with what munitions we will be attacking those who have been attacking US! Yea, the info divulged obviously made our pilots safer, for fckz sake, that’s ridiculous !
So... A fuck-up that occurred over a decade ago somehow makes it ok to fuck up today.
MAGA is ok with doing today whatever any Dem has ever done in the past.
What party was Benedict Arnold?
Is that what was in the texts? Please share link
No. "Show me the proof" is just a tactic. It's used by all the Usual Suspects.
Somehow, the MAGA positions itself as judge of whatever "proof" you may bring... and oh surprise, it is always inadequate.
MAGA disqualifies anything that disagrees with its dogma. Reality is irrelevant.
I am not sure i would call Goldberg an enemy, a lying piece of shit, sure, but not an enemy who has ties to a terrorist state like Iran, do you have information about Goldberg the rest of us should know so we can list him as an enemy to the US?
So we have moved past putting American lives at risk, well that is a start, and exactly when did the Houthis attack us? do you have a link to this attack?
You can't put a pilot at risk with an enemy that has zero ability to retaliate, or attack said pilots, do you have a link to the Houthis Airforce or air defense systems? and was this drones and cruise missiles? do you even know?
Apparently
Arnold was a member of the Traitor Party
Then I may as well ignore all of them
Please enlighten us Bob, what party was Benedict Arnold a member of?
Not a MAGA,.then. I guess the rule of "anything the other party has ever done is ok for us now"... means that MAGA is ok with betraying the country. "If Benedict Arnold did it, then it's ok for us!"
That explains a lot...
At least not waste your time answering.
Ditto for Dems..............
Since you won't answer i will answer for you, Benedict Arnold was a member of what we now call the democratic party.
There are some idiot posts that claim he was part of the republican national party but that wasn't created until the 1820's a full 20 years after Arnolds death. there was a republican party, it became the democratic-republican party which is now the democratic party or as Trout put it, the traitor party.
Political parties in the United States - Wikipedia
Hard for Arnold to be a member of a party that didn't exist until 20 years after he died and it has no relation to the modern republican party.
yep
coz....I'm starting to feel like I could lose it. I really don't like these guys
if Goldberg knew, who else might have known? Russia, China ? You think they aren’t trying to harvest our information ?
Anytime our WAR PLANS are discussed Not In a secure SKiff, Americans lives are at greater risk! Don’t even try and tell US they are not. There are REASONS WAR PLANS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE SECRET !
The Houthis have attacked our ships, Israel, and our allies as well. WTF are you saying ? Houthis are only Blow Fish ?
We most certainly give our enemies, all of them, a better chance of risking our mission if they know when, where, and with what they are facing. You know, possibly attempting to hide their drones and or launchers locations.
There is absolutely NO UPSIDE to this major Fck up, because of the Major FCK UP, that appointed these inexperienced major fck ups to positions they can majorly FCK UP !
So now we are down to rank speculation,
So you think that they don't have encrypted communication channels and they all have to be together in the same place. and there is still no proof that War plans were discussed.
We attacked them to protect Europe's shipping, did you read any parts of the chain? the Houthis are not a threat to us in any shape of form FFS what are you talking about?
Sigh, again unless Goldberg is an enemy we didn't tell them anything, not like releasing the names of the people who killed Bib Laden
There it is, the typical deflection to trump, pathetic. and by no stretch of the imagination is this major. releasing the head of the CIA's name in Afghanistan was major, this is a manufactured crisis.
I think there's a sort of "handbook", not necessarily a literal "book", but at least a collection of "best practices", that circulates among MAGAs. It may be produced by pros from some think tank like the Heritage Foundation (of Project 2025 infamy) or it may be more local, with You-know-who-1 and You-know-who-2 giving instructions to our Usual Suspects.
The behavior of our MAGAs is too standardized to be coincidence. These guys aren't smart. They prove every day that they aren't smart. And yet they use sophisticated debate techniques. So... somebody's coaching them.
Also... Have you noticed that genuine conversation with our MAGAs is impossible? That they always derail? ALWAYS? You'd think that at least once in a while one of them would get caught up in a conversation. Nope. I don't believe this is a coincidence, either.
My guess is that NT's chatroom is "helpful"...
Those "goat herders" have doing quite well shooting down MQ-9 Reaper drones.
The Tea Party passed down their well worn and notated copies of Rules 4 Radicals to the MAGA crowd.
Both of them? Lol
Eh? I've not seen that, Bob. TiG is the one with the superior debate skills in these parts and they always fold and fade when he goes after them
We gave them the RPGs
TiG's skills are completely different. He collects facts, and applies logic. So of course the Usual Suspects have no response. No valid response. But they respond anyway.
They have an entire arsenal of deflection, denial, outright lies, personal attacks... And they all - each and every one of them - have the same arsenal, as though they've all attended the same training facility.
I think they are quite pleased to "argue" with TiG (or any of the reasonable people here) because the argument is always futile. Derailed. Denied. The objective for MAGA is to discredit all intelligent conversation. They want to transform the public debate space into a wasteland.
I see your point
Recently, this "group of goatherders" shot a missile at Israel. it was intercepted:
Yemen's rebel Houthi group has said it has fired a missile at Israel, which was intercepted.
The ballistic missile was fired toward Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, the group's military spokesperson said in a televised statement.
"A missile launched from Yemen was i ntercepted by the IAF prior to crossing into Israeli territory. Sirens were sounded in accordance with protocol," the Israeli military said in a statement, referring to its air force.
Those "goatherding Houthis" have advanced weapons supplied by Iran.
More recently Iran has been supplying them:
DIA Report Showcases Iranian Origin of Houthi Weapons Interdicted at Sea
Link?
“Every time I think…”
The first thought is to castigate the ‘left’, ignoring the present reality in mindless apologetics.
BTW, while we're on the subject (of attempting to derail the discussion of the actual subject) ... what brand of #beer do you drink?
Mr Giggles and were discussing this last night. We both would have faced courts-martial if we had been this careless. If not a court-martial at the very least a severe reprimand that would have ended our careers
These people are outside the law. They make rules for the rest of us, but are themselves bound by none.
MAGA made them our masters. Absolute rulers.
oh you silly girl, trumpski sycophants don't get prosecuted by any US laws ...
I'm expecting the incompetent trumpski administration to blame goldberg, and then charge him with espionage for having no security clearance ...
The GOP response has generally been "we bombed the Houthis didnt we, so its all good".
Goldberg showed remarkable professional restraint in not releasing the sensitive information prior to the imminent launching of the attack. He also did the right thing in exposing the truth about the inexplicable atrocities of the situation.
But as you stated, he may face the brunt of yet another effort from this dysfunctional administration to place blame on him for their failure. Retribution as a first priority is no way to govern.
like most all republican administrations, the melon felon is just a brainless figurehead ...
Tim Miller of The Bulwark interviewed Jeffery Goldberg and he said because he has been accused of lying about the texts he may release some of them .
www.nationalreview.com /the-morning-jolt/bad-signal-an-ugly-mistake-and-no-one-will-be-held-accountable/
Bad Signal: An Ugly Mistake, and No One Will Be Held Accountable
By Jim Geraghty
A National Security Debacle
One of President Trump’s best moments in his debate with Joe Biden :
This morning, the president has plenty of good reasons to fire his entire national-security team. He won’t do this, of course, but this means the president must shrug off half his cabinet discussing classified information — details about an impending U.S. military strike! — on an insecure system.
Jeffrey Goldberg, writing in The Atlantic :
Our Kayla Bartsch offered the plausible theory that Waltz meant to include U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, in the Signal chat instead; Jeffrey Goldberg noted that he only appeared on the screen as “JG.”
Goldberg wrote that one post from Hegseth “contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.”
Brian Hughes, the spokesman for the National Security Council, issued a statement declaring, “The message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain.”
Problem one is that the entire national security team is using Signal to discuss classified information. Signal is not secure; earlier this year, the Google Threat Intelligence Group warned that Russia-backed hacking groups have “developed techniques to compromise encrypted messaging services, including Signal, WhatsApp and Telegram.” As noted above, Witkoff was on the chain, and he was in Moscow while these messages were exchanged .
Problem two is that Waltz accidentally invited journalist Goldberg.
Problem three is that on the Signal chat, Hegseth boasted about the operational security of the assembled Trump team. Goldberg wrote, “In his text detailing aspects of the forthcoming attack on Houthi targets, Hegseth wrote to the group — which, at the time, included me — ‘We are currently clean on OPSEC.’” Not as clean as you think, Mr. Secretary!
Problem four is that one day after the chat started, director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard posted on X , “Any unauthorized release of classified information is a violation of the law and will be treated as such.”
Any unauthorized release, huh?
Every U.S. government official on that Signal text chain who discussed classified information committed a crime. Under 18 U.S. Code § 798 , “Whoever knowingly and willfully communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available to an unauthorized person . . . classified information . . . shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.”
Republicans spent years rightfully arguing that Hillary Clinton committed a crime when she kept classified information on her private server — including these particular Republicans!
Back as a Fox News host in 2016, Pete Hegseth asked , “How damaging is it to your ability to recruit or build allies with others when they are worried that our leaders may be exposing them because of their gross negligence or their recklessness in handling information?” And in 2023, while discussing Joe Biden’s handling of classified information, Hegseth fumed , “If at the very top, there’s no accountability . . . that’s the two tiers of justice that exists.”
In 2023, Mike Waltz tweeted , “Talk about a DOUBLE STANDARD: Biden’s sitting National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan sent top secret emails to Hillary Clinton’s private account and the DOJ didn’t do a DAMN THING about it. No wonder Americans are losing faith in our justice system.”
This is not holding these officials to some arbitrary or unfairly high standard. This is holding them to their own publicly declared standards.
Now we’re going to hear a lot of excuses, and a lot of insistence that this case doesn’t really count.
Hegseth, disappointingly, seems to think he can get out of this by attacking Goldberg. “You’re talking about a deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist, who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again. . . . This is a guy who peddles garbage, this is what he does.”
Except . . . the White House National Security Council spokesman already said the messages appear to be authentic. And House Speaker Mike Johnson . The Atlantic published screenshots.
Hegseth insisted, “Nobody was texting war plans.”
No, just “operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing” and when the attack would begin . That’s a very Bill Clinton-ian definition of “war plans.”
As of this writing, there’s no indication that President Trump intends to discipline anyone over any of this. At the White House, Trump was asked about it and responded :
(If Trump is telling the truth, it reflects very badly on Mike Waltz and Pete Hegseth. When there is a screwup, the president deserves to learn about it from his own people, not through the media. Goldberg said he emailed Waltz, Hegseth, Ratcliffe, Gabbard, and other officials Monday morning, asking if the text chain was authentic, and NSC spokesman Hughes replied two hours later. Trump was asked about it at an event that began at 2 p.m. Eastern. You can’t tell me that none of those officials could get ahold of the president all day.)
Just four days ago , a Department of Defense employee pled guilty to unauthorized removal and retention of classified material; he’s scheduled to be sentenced on June 17 and faces up to five years in prison. On January 17, a former CIA analyst pled guilty to retaining and transmitting top-secret information to people who were not entitled to receive it; he’ll be sentenced in May for a maximum of ten years on each count. In November, a former member of the United States Air National Guard was sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to six counts of willful retention and transmission of classified information.
It’s the same old story. If you’re low-ranking, you face serious criminal charges for mishandling classified information. If you’re high-ranking and a famous name, you usually get let off with minimal consequences , sometimes no consequences at all.
I like Mike Waltz and Pete Hegseth. I want them to succeed. The country’s security depends upon their successful execution of their duties and good judgment. But these are lapses in decision-making that are inexcusable. Waltz must know that Signal isn’t a secure system for communication, and he’s got to know better than to just add any old “JG” to the chat list without checking. Hegseth must know he can’t just discuss highly secret war plans on an insecure system. A lot of critics argued Hegseth was too young and inexperienced to run the Pentagon. Making a mistake like this makes his critics look prescient.
At NR today, John Noonan makes the argument that the country needs Mike Waltz to remain as national security adviser, and urges, “Let He among us who has never fat fingered a text, or an email, or tweet cast the first stone.”
Maybe we don’t need to get rid of Waltz or Hegseth. But it would have been nice if either man had notified the president immediately and taken responsibility for the screwup. At this point, there’s no sign that happened; instead of taking responsibility, Hegseth seems to think he can get out of this by blaming Goldberg.
Our Dan McLaughlin : “If only we had a federal agency under the digital services that was focused on efficiency and headed by a famously brilliant tech innovator to figure out how to let a few dozen senior people talk to each other securely.”
ADDENDUM: To clarify for apparently a whole bunch of people on social media who get confused, Jeffery Goldberg is the guy who runs The Atlantic ; Jonah Goldberg is our old friend who runs The Dispatch ; Whoopi Goldberg is one of the hosts of The View ; Bill Goldberg is a wrestler; The Goldbergs was a sitcom.
These are among the many . . . Goldberg Variations .
Soon they will issue an authoritarian decree striking the word "scandal" from the English language.