The NAACP warned against the sweeping executive order Trump signed yesterday that aims to overhaul U.S. election administration and implement requirements controversial among voting rights groups, including requiring voters to provide documented proof of their U.S. citizenship before voting in federal elections.
“Trump’s so-called executive order is blatantly unconstitutional and designed to disenfranchise millions of lawful, eligible voters. In America, Presidents do not control elections,” said NAACP President Derrick Johnson. “Trump is clearly pushing the boundaries of executive power, and seeing how much he can get away with. It’s time for the public and all elected officials to speak up as loudly as they can before our country is stolen from its people. If we hand the president control over how elections are run in America, we no longer live in a democracy.”
The order, called Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections, moves key election administration decisions typically left to the states under control of the Executive Branch. It threatens to withhold federal funding, which states rely on to safely and securely administer elections, from states who do not comply with the order’s provisions.
Trump’s order explicitly targets mail-in voting, which the president has baselessly claimed to be rife with fraud, despite encouraging his own voter base to vote absentee throughout the 2024 campaign cycle after realizing its popularity among registered Republicans.
Currently, decisions about whether to accept mail-in ballots postmarked by election day but received at county recorder’s offices after it has passed are left to states to decide. Trump’s order seeks to change that by mandating that states must reject mail-in ballots unless they are “cast and received” by election day.
The order is largely expected to face legal challenges over its constitutionality, since the Constitution grants state’s broad authority to decide how to administer elections.
“This isn’t just another executive order—it is a test to see if we allow the president crown himself,” Johnson said in the statement.
Witkoff denied having a personal device with him during his trip to Russia, saying in a post to X that he had only a government issued secure phone during his travels and suggested that was why he did not comment in the group chat for a period of time.
Witkoff’s post was responding to an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, which referenced press reports about Witkoff “receiving these messages on the commercial app while in Moscow.”
He did not confirm in the post whether he had been using Signal on a government device or personal device. But when recounting why he was silent for portions of the group chat discussion, Witkoff said it was “because I had no access to my personal devices until I returned from my trip.”
Witkoff’s tweet comes after Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., sent a letter to Gabbard and Witkoff requesting information about their use of Signal on personal devices by March 31.
“The national security breach caused by sharing sensitive military information over an unclassified messaging application is compounded by the fact that both of you, who are prime targets for foreign intelligence services, were traveling in high-threat environments that pose significant counterintelligence risks to U.S. personnel and devices,” Schiff said in the letter.
NBC News has previously reported that cyber security experts say government phones are generally considered more secure than personal devices.
In an extended back-and-forth about the military plans group chat, Karoline Leavitt directed reporters to comments by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth asserting that the contents were not classified — even as messages seemingly shared by Hegseth detailed the timing of an attack against the Houthis, and some of the weapons used, shortly before it occurred.
“It’s not just me saying that,” Leavitt said. “It’s the secretary of defense himself who is saying this as well. And he put out a very strong statement earlier today listing all of the things that were not included in that message that he sent to the group. And again, this message, there was no classified information transmitted. There were no more plans discussed.”
Pressed by a reporter on why the strike launch times wouldn’t be classified, Leavitt said, “I would defer to you to the secretary of defense’s statement he put out this morning. There were various reasons he listed, things that were not included in that messaging thread that were not classified.”
“Going back to the American public: Do you trust the secretary of defense … or do you trust Jeffrey Goldberg?” she added.
In one of several of the messages released by The Atlantic, Hegseth at one point shared in all caps with the group that “this is when the first bombs will definitely drop.”
Leavitt maintained that nothing classified had been discussed by the group of top officials in the chat.
“We have said all along that no classified material was sent on this messaging thread,” she said. “There were no locations, no sources or methods revealed, and there were certainly no war plans discussed.”
The White House press briefing ended after about 20 minutes, which is shorter than usual.
Leavitt was asked numerous questions about the Signal group chat.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a Biden administration effort to regulate “ghost gun” kits that allow people to easily obtain parts needed to assemble firearms from online sellers.
The decision by a court that often backs gun rights resolves the legal dispute over whether the kits can be regulated the same way as other firearms.
Trump will announce tariffs on the auto industry today at 4 p.m., according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.
Leavitt said during today’s news conference that Trump would hold a news conference in the Oval Office to make the announcement.
Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., is requesting information from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff about whether they used Signal on personal devices as part of their jobs and is questioning whether the two were abroad during the chat involving The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief.
In a letter to the two Trump administration officials, Schiff wrote that he has grave concerns about their “participation in highly sensitive Principals Committee deliberations about a planned military operation using the commercial messaging service Signal while you were both on foreign travel.”
“The national security breach caused by sharing sensitive military information over an unclassified messaging application is compounded by the fact that both of you, who are prime targets for foreign intelligence services, were traveling in high-threat environments that pose significant counterintelligence risks to U.S. personnel and devices,” Schiff wrote.
Schiff noted that public records show that Gabbard was on a multination tour to Asia that included stops in Japan, Thailand and India during the time of the Signal chat involving The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg.
The Democratic senator also said in his letter that reporting has revealed that Witkoff was in Russia at the time, meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“This means that Mr. Witkoff appeared to be receiving sensitive national intelligence information while in Moscow and, based on this timeline, may have been in direct meetings with the Kremlin when some of the messages were exchanged,” Schiff said.
Schiff asked that they respond to a number of questions in the letter by March 31, including whether they have used Signal for work-related purposes on their personal devices since Trump’s inauguration.
The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to allow it to terminate about $600 million in Education Department grants.
The administration previously tried to terminate the grants, but a district judge blocked the move and ordered that the administration immediately reinstate the funds. The Trump administration is now asking the Supreme Court to reverse the lower court’s decision.
“This case exemplifies a flood of recent suits that raise the question: ‘Does a single district-court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the Government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever)’ millions in taxpayer dollars,” the government wrote.
The group that originally sued to block the grant termination, authorized by Congress, argued that the funds are necessary to “address nationwide teacher shortages and improve teacher quality by educating, placing, and supporting new teachers in hard-to-staff schools, especially in rural and other underserved communities, and in hard-to-staff subjects, such as math and special education.”
Senate Armed Services Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., told reporters today that he and ranking member Jack Reed, D-R.I., are asking the administration for an “expedited” inspector general report into a Trump Cabinet-level chat that revealed military strike information to a journalist who was inadvertently included in the discussion.
“We are signing a letter today asking the administration to expedite an IG report back to the committee,” Wicker said. “We’re sending a similar letter to the administration in an attempt to get ground truth. We certainly want to know if the transcript that has been published is accurate.”
Wicker said he is confident the Pentagon will follow through with a report despite Trump’s firing of the Defense Department’s inspector general, along with several other of the independent watchdogs at major departments, shortly after he took office.
Asked if he thinks the information discussed in the Signal app chat was, or should have been, classified, Wicker said, “The information as published recently appears to me to be of such a sensitive nature that, based on my knowledge, I would have wanted it classified.”
Wicker said he will also request a classified briefing for committee members from a “senior person” in the administration. Asked if that person should be Hegseth, Wicker said, “We will want someone that that actually has the facts and can speak on behalf of the administration.”
The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has adjourned the public portion of its annual hearing on worldwide threats.
The committee will now move into a closed session where top U.S. intelligence officials will continue their testimony.
A majority of American voters are generally disappointed with the people President Donald Trump has appointed to posts in his administration, according to an NBC News poll earlier this month — a record share in a question NBC News has measured at the start of four previous administrations.
The survey was conducted March 7-11, before The Atlantic published a story Monday revealing that a number of senior Trump administration officials — including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, national security adviser Mike Waltz and others — participated in a Signal chat thread about plans to launch airstrikes against Houthi militants, in which Hegseth shared plans including the timing and types of aircraft used.
The Signal thread included The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, as well as Hegseth, Waltz, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and others.
Gabbard defended the group chat by reiterating an argument that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth can declassify information.
“Secretary Hegseth has the classification and declassification authority over DOD information,” Gabbard said, referring to the Defense Department.
Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, D-Penn., urged Gabbard to investigate the situation, speculating that it is “likely to be more than just this chat.”
Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Calif., pressed Gabbard about whether she stood by her testimony before the Senate yesterday that she did not recall discussions of specific weapons, timing or targets.
“My response in the Senate yesterday, yes, I stand by that response,” Gabbard said. “Obviously the release of the screenshots that came from that chat group today were a refresher on what happened. As I said earlier, I was not involved with that portion of the chat, so it did not come to my recollection yesterday.”
Gomez noted shortly after that the administration has said they want to “drain the swamp.” “But you have become that swamp in a matter of days,” Gomez said. “Not weeks or months. Days.”
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., defended the Trump administration officials who participated in the Signal chat that revealed sensitive military information to The Atlantic, even after the contents of the discussion were released this morning by the magazine.
Cotton said he doesn’t think Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth broke the law in discussing pending attacks in Yemen.
“There was no locations listed there,” Cotton said. “There were no sources of methods. There’s no specific targets. Certainly, there was nothing called war plans, which was an embellishment and exaggeration by a known left-wing partisan opponent of the president.”
Cotton also said he doesn’t see his committee investigating the security breach because “to the extent there was any allegation of classified information here, that was not information that was coming from either Tulsi Gabbard or John Ratcliffe. So, as far as I know, it’s outside of our jurisdiction.”
When pressed on whether intelligence officers or the Department of Defense should share this kind of information on Signal in the future, Cotton noted that Ratcliffe said yesterday that the Signal messaging app had been installed on his computer at CIA.
“I’m sure the administration, like all administrations, will continue to review how it communicates inside and deliberates consistent with the requirements of operational security and presidential record-keeping rules,” he said. “But I think here the real story is the incredibly successful strikes in Yemen that has protected our sailors and protected our friends in Israel and international shipping, and that’s where we should focus.”
Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Calif., questioned Ratcliffe and Gabbard about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s drinking habits during his line of questioning about the Signal group chat information leak at this morning’s House Intelligence Committee hearing.
“The main person who was involved in this thread, that a lot of people want to talk to, is Secretary of Defense Hegseth, and a lot of questions were brought up regarding his drinking habits in his confirmation hearing,” Gomez said. “To your knowledge, do you know whether Pete Hegseth had been drinking before he leaked classified information?”
Ratcliffe denied that Hegseth had been drinking before texting detailed plans of the strike in Yemen over Signal and called Gomez’s line of questioning “offensive.”
“You don’t want to focus on the good work the CIA is doing, the intelligence community…” Ratcliffe said in a raised voice, prompting Gomez to shout over him to “reclaim his time” for questions.
“I have huge respect for the CIA, huge respect for men and women in uniform,” Gomez said. “But this was a question that’s on the top of minds of every American right. He stood in front of the podium in Europe holding a drink. So of course, we want to know if his performance is compromised.”
At this morning’s House Intelligence Committee hearing, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., cited the Trump administration’s own language in pressing the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency on the administration’s claim that a high-level Signal chat that revealed sensitive information on military strikes was unclassified.
Krishnamoorthi read a Trump administration executive order on classified information, which holds that “information should be classified if its unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause damage to national security, including military plans, weapons systems or operations.”
“We clearly have weapons systems that have been identified, that is classified information,” Krishnamoorthi said, pointing to a blown-up picture of the plans texted by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in the Signal group chat. “The reason why it’s important that this information not be disclosed is that we don’t want the adversaries to know what’s about to happen.”
Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill.,points to a printout of a text message by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.J. Scott Applewhite / AP
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The DIA director, Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, argued that the military terms used in Hegseth’s texts lacked specific context and could have been used in any number of operations.
But Krishnamoorthi countered that “Secretary Hegsth has disclosed military plans as well as classified information,” adding, “He needs to resign immediately and a full investigation needs to be undertaken with regard to whether other similar Signal chats are occurring.”
Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, quipped about the emojis used in the Signal chat reacting to the Yemen strikes.
“I will note I always use fire emojis when I see terrorists getting killed,” he said.
After the strikes in Yemen, Waltz responded in the group chat with the fist, American flag and fire emojis.
The judge who the government has argued can’t be trusted with sensitive information in the Alien Enemies Act case has been assigned to a case about top government officials appearing to share sensitive information on the commercial messaging application Signal.
U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg in the District of Columbia has been assigned to oversee the case of American Oversight against top officials involved in a Signal group chat about an attack in Yemen. The lawsuit seeks to make sure the officials are not using the app to get around federal record-keeping requirements.
“Messages in the Signal chat about official government actions, including, but not limited to, national security deliberations, are federal records and must be preserved in accordance with federal statutes, and agency directives, rules, and regulations,” the plaintiffs argue.
Gabbard is one of the defendants in the case, and used the suit as argument for why she couldn’t answer some questions about the group chat in today’s House hearing.
“As a result of that pending litigation, I’m limited in my ability to comment further” on the case, she testified.
Boasberg is overseeing a separate civil case in which alleged Venezuelan gang members have sued to stop from being deported under Trump’s invocation of the rarely used Alien Enemies Act. The administration has refused to answer some of the judge’s questions about the initial March 15 deportations in the case and suggested in a filing it did not believe the court could be trusted with such sensitive information.
Trump, meanwhile, has repeatedly bashed the judge for issuing a temporary restraining order in the case.
The Espionage Act, the law that often has been used in criminal cases involving leaks or mishandling of classified information, contains a provision making it crime to disclose national defense secrets “through gross negligence.”
The law does not require that the information be classified, because it was written before the classification system existed. The law refers simply to “national defense information.”
The specific provision reads: “(e) whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blue print, plan, map, model, note, or information, relating to the national defense, through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be list, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $10,000, or by imprisonment for not more than two years, or both.”
Brad Moss, an attorney whose practice is devoted to issues of security clearances and classified information, said that is “the most reasonably applicable provision from the Espionage Act both for Secretary Hegseth and for national security adviser Waltz,” referring to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and top Trump aide Mike Waltz, who took part in a high-level group chat onYemen strike plans that inadvertently included The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief.
This provision was cited by critics of the decision by the FBI not to recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton in connection with the classified information she and her aides discussed on an unsecure private email system.
“In order to give Mrs. Clinton a pass, the FBI rewrote the statute, inserting an intent element that Congress did not require,” legal scholar Andrew McCarthy wrote for National Review, including bold type for emphasis. “The added intent element, moreover, makes no sense: The point of having a statute that criminalizes gross negligence is to underscore that government officials have a special obligation to safeguard national defense secrets; when they fail to carry out that obligation due to gross negligence, they are guilty of serious wrongdoing.”
Moss said another law that seems to apply here is 18 USC 1924, which makes it a crime to remove classified information to retain it “at an unauthorized location.” While the law does require the material in question to be classified, Moss said there could be no doubt that the material disclosed in the Trump administration officials’ group chat was classified.
“There’s no way any reasonable person would think that military operational details or real time intelligence about military strikes is not classified, and if they do, they’re not qualified to hold senior positions in the U.S. government,” he said.
Under normal circumstances, Moss said, the DNI would be conducting a damage assessment to figure out exactly information was shared in these chats on a non-government platform and to determine what information reached the reporter, and likely a criminal referral to the Justice Department would follow.
Moss said he does not think that will happen under this administration.
Trump officials have repeatedly said the messages in the Signal app chat included no classified information, and in testimony before the House Intelligence Committee this morning, Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, continued to insist on that point. Gabbard also said the National Security Council was conducting a review of the incident.
There is precedent for high-level officials getting in trouble for leaks or mishandling secrets. When the name of an undercover CIA officer was leaked during the George W. Bush administration, a special prosecutor was appointed that resulted in criminal charges against the vice president’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby. In recent times, former CIA Director John Deutsch and former national security adviser Sandy Berger were among those disciplined for mishandling incidents. And former CIA Director David Petraeus was prosecuted a decade ago after he gave notebooks containing military secrets to someone writing a book about him.
Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, said it was a “lie” to say that information discussed in the Signal chat would not be considered classified.
Castro asked National Security Agency Director Timothy Haugh whether similar information intercepted from China or Russia would have been considered classified information.
“We would classify based off of our sources and methods,” Haugh answered.
Earlier, Castro said that “the idea that this information, if it was presented to our committee, would not be classified, y’all know is a lie.”
“That’s ridiculous. I’ve seen things much less sensitive be presented to us with high classification, and to say that it isn’t is a lie to the country,” he continued.
The government has repeatedly said there was no classified information in the group chat.
The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., pressed National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard on her reposting of tweets from a known right-wing Russian state media personality despite representing the United States intelligence community on the world stage in her official capacity.
“I have one last question for you, because I think people really listen to what you have to say,” Himes said. “You, on March 15, as DNI, retweeted a post from Ian Miles Cheong, who is listed on RT, that’s Russia Today’s website, as ‘a political and cultural commentator’ who has contributed content to RT since at least 2022.”
Russia Today is a known source of Russian state propaganda and has long been used as a tool of soft power to promote Russian interests on the world stage. The Department of Justice last year accused the platform of covertly paying pro-Trump influencers.
“Do you think that it’s responsible for you as head of the intelligence community and the principal presidential intelligence advisor, to retweet posts from individuals affiliated with Russian state media?” Himes asked.
Gabbard, who was grilled by Senators during her confirmation hearing over past comments defending Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, argued that because the retweet came from her personal account, it presents no conflict of interest with her official role as intelligence director.
“I maintain my First Amendment rights to be able to express my own personal views on different issues,” Gabbard said.
Cheong posted his reaction to the exchange on X, saying “DNI Tulsi Gabbard shared my post on the shutdown of the US Agency for Global Media, which operated the propaganda outfits Voice of America and RFERL.”
Gabbard addressed the Signal controversy in her opening remarks before the House Intelligence Committee, referring to Waltz’s previous comments and noting that he has “taken full responsibility.”
She said Trump’s and Waltz’s comments yesterday had a “clear message: It was a mistake that a reporter was inadvertently added to a Signal chat with high-level national security principles having a policy discussion about imminent strikes against the Houthis and the effects of the strike.”
“National Security advisor has taken full responsibility for this, and the National Security Council is conducting an in-depth review, along with technical experts working to determine how this reporter was inadvertently added to this chat,” she added.
Gabbard maintained that classified information was not shared, but called the conversation “candid and sensitive.”
National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard testifies today.Drew Angerer / AFP – Getty Images
“There were no sources, methods, locations or war plans that were shared,” she claimed. “This was a standard update to the national security cabinet that was provided alongside updates that were given to foreign partners in the region.”
Gabbard also said that Signal is pre-installed on government devices. NBC News has not independently verified this.
She referred to a pending lawsuit as a reason why she would be “limited” in commenting further on the issue.
A contentious Senate hearing yesterday raised questions about how Trump administration officials handle sensitive national security information and communications, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s decision to share a planned U.S. military operation in a group chat.
Of the more than dozen senior U.S. officials on a Signal text chain that was inadvertently leaked to a journalist, Hegseth was the only one who shared details of the planned U.S. airstrikes in Yemen.
After welcoming a witness panel composed of some of the same U.S. intelligence officials who were involved in a Signal group chat that leaked military plans to a magazine editor, Rep. Rick Crawford, R-Ark., used his opening remarks at the House Select Committee on Intelligence hearing this morning to slam his Senate colleagues for their focus on the incident in their own intelligence hearing yesterday.
“Yesterday, our colleagues on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence held their hearing on the annual threat assessment,” Crawford said. “And unfortunately, instead of exploring the real and existential threats that face our nation, which is the purpose of this hearing, this issue consumed most of their time, while I will address this topic further in my questions, it’s my sincere hope that we use this hearing to discuss the many foreign threats facing our nation.”
Crawford added that the annual worldwide threats hearings in the House and Senate are intended to provide the American people with the opportunity to hear directly from U.S. intelligence leaders, and focusing too much on the Signal scandal will take away from that opportunity.
“I have deep concerns about the state of our national security,” Crawford said, citing the involvement of North Korean troops in the Russia-Ukraine war, geopolitical tensions with China and the span of Iran-sponsored terrorist groups across the Middle East.
The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Jim Himes, said that “everyone here knows” that Russian or Chinese officials could have obtained messages where details of a military operation were sent out in a Signal chat, saying it was “by the awesome grace of God that we are not mourning dead pilots right now.”
Himes, D-Conn., said that people involved in the chat should “apologize,” “own it,” and figure out what went wrong and how to prevent it in the future.
“That’s not what happened,” he added.
Himes also said the U.S. now appears to be on “Team Kremlin,” criticizing U.S. officials’ perspectives toward the war in Ukraine. He criticized DOGE-related firings and argued that U.S. adversaries “cannot believe their luck.”
The Trump administration says travelers’ political beliefs are not influencing it to deny entry, deport or detain travelers from Western nations after a spate of incidents, including some searches of electronic devices.
“Allegations that political beliefs trigger inspections or removals are baseless and irresponsible,” Customs and Border Protection said in a statement.
The French interior minister alleged that a French researcher had been turned away by U.S. border agents earlier this month after they found messages critical of the Trump administration on his phone. Another case this month involved a Rhode Island doctor, Rasha Alawieh, who was deported to Lebanon despite having a valid U.S. visa.
Both media searches “followed all policies and protocols,” CBP Assistant Commissioner Hilton Beckham told NBC News in a statement. Claims that the agency is “searching more electronic media due to the administration change are false,” he added.
“In the cases of the French scientist and Dr. Alawieh, media searches followed all policies and protocols, leading to the discovery of proprietary information from Los Alamo National Laboratory — violating a non-disclosure agreement — and Hezbollah martyr content,” Beckham said.
“These searches are conducted to detect digital contraband, terrorism-related content, and information relevant to visitor admissibility,” he added.
The Atlantic released details this morning of the top Trump officials’ chat that revealed military strike plans to the magazine’s editor-in-chief.
The release of the messages in the chat follows repeated denials from the Trump administration that any war plans were discussed on the chat or that the information was classified.
The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg had previously declined to release parts of the conversation, saying that if the messages were read by an adversary, the information “could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel.”
The messages released today showed that a text from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth about imminent military strikes in Yemen were highly detailed. In them, he laid out the exact timing of the pending strikes. The messages did not include specific targeting locations.
A network of companies operated by a secretive Chinese tech firm has been trying to recruit recently laid-off U.S. government workers, according to job ads and a researcher who uncovered the campaign.
Max Lesser, a senior analyst on emerging threats with the Washington-based think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said some companies placing recruitment ads were “part of a broader network of fake consulting and headhunting firms targeting former government employees and AI researchers.”
Lawmakers will have another chance to question Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe today about leaked military plans, this time at a House Intelligence Committee hearing.
The hearing comes one day after the officials — both reportedly members of the Signal group chat reported by The Atlantic — faced pointed questions from Democrats over the group chat’s contents and security.
The hearing has an open session beginning at 10 a.m. and a closed-door session for lawmakers at 2 p.m.
Committee Chairman Rick Crawford, R-Ark., has not yet weighed in publicly on The Atlantic’s reporting. The top Democrat on the committee, Connecticut Rep. Jim Himes, said he was “horrified” by the report.
“These individuals know the calamitous risks of transmitting classified information across unclassified systems, and they also know that if a lower ranking official under their command did what is described here, they would likely lose their clearance and be subject to criminal investigation,” Himes said. “The American people deserve answers, and I plan to get some on Wednesday at the Intelligence Committee’s Worldwide Threats hearing.”
Trump’s national security adviser, Mike Waltz, said in an interview that he takes “full responsibility” for a group text that included a journalist while discussing military plans.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and top Democrats on the national security committees, are issuing a letter to Trump asking for additional details regarding a text chain about military planning that inadvertently included The Atlantic’s top editor.
“Our committees have serious questions about this incident, and members need a full accounting to ensure it never happens again,” the senators wrote.
They expressed their “extreme alarm about the astonishingly poor judgment shown by your Cabinet and national security advisors” following the report about leaked military plans for strikes in Yemen.
“You have long advocated for accountability and transparency in the government, particularly as it relates to the handling of classified information, national security, and the safety of American servicemembers,” the senators said. “As such, it is imperative that you address this breach with the seriousness and diligence that it demands.”
The senators said that they “expect” that Attorney General Pam Bondi will conduct an investigation “of the conduct of the government officials involved in improperly sharing or discussing such information.”
The senators are also seeking the full unredacted transcript of the text chain for the committees to review, asking whether other White House officials are using Signal or other commercial platforms to discuss classified or sensitive information, and urging relevant agencies to preserve documents and correspondences regarding the incident.
In addition to Schumer, the letter was signed by the top Democrats on the Intelligence Committee, the Judiciary Committee, the Armed Services Committee, the Foreign Relations Committee, the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee and the Appropriations subcommittee on defense.
Finalizing applications filed by certain immigrants to become legal permanent residents is being put on hold to comply with an executive order Trump signed in January.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the part of the Department of Homeland Security that handles citizenship, legal status and other immigration benefits, has suspended processing some applications for so-called green cards to do more vetting of the applicants, the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.
Reporting from Washington
The latest attempt by conservatives to undermine the federal bureaucracy reaches the Supreme Court today as the justices consider whether the Federal Communications Commission unlawfully wields power through a program that subsidizes telecommunications services in underserved regions.
The court has a 6-3 conservative majority that has in a series of recent decisions undercut the authority of government agencies and advanced a deregulatory agenda largely favored by business interests and Republicans.
The case concerns both whether Congress in a 1996 law exceeded its authority in setting up the Universal Service Fund, which requires telecommunications services to submit payments to subsidize “universal service” in low-income and rural areas.
