U.S. Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nevada, is spearheading an effort to demand Senate hearings on the discussion of classified military operations over unsecured devices. A letter signed by Rosen and 15 other Democratic senators was sent to three Senate committees following a security breach where Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth posted attack-plan details in a Signal messaging chat ahead of U.S. airstrikes in Yemen.
The chat included Hegseth, National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, Vice President J.D. Vance, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, and others. However, it also inadvertently included The Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, whose subsequent article exposed the mishandling of classified information. The White House acknowledged the error Thursday, stating it was “making changes” to prevent similar mistakes, while Waltz took responsibility for the breach.
The senators’ letter, dated March 27, calls for hearings by the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Senate Armed Services Committee, chaired by Roger Wick, R-Mississippi, has already announced plans for an investigation.
Rosen and her colleagues argue that Trump administration officials “recklessly and illegally” discussed classified military operations in a group chat, endangering national security. The chat reportedly contained timestamps for planned military strikes against the Houthis, a Yemeni rebel group. The senators warned that consumer-grade smartphones are highly vulnerable to foreign hacking, posing a grave risk to military personnel.
“This gross mishandling of highly classified information has weakened our national security and could have put at risk American lives, particularly the men and women involved in the military strikes in Yemen,” the letter states.
The letter is signed by senators from Arizona, Illinois, New Mexico, Connecticut, New York, Virginia, Hawaii, Maryland, New Jersey, Michigan, Oregon, and Georgia, all of whom sit on one or more of the relevant committees. The push for hearings signals heightened concerns over national security vulnerabilities and the improper handling of classified information at the highest levels of government.
