Military hawks in Senate request probe into intelligence leak

Across Washington, the Signal leak presented a major test early in Trump’s second term on the federal government’s system of checks and balances meant to protect national security. Yet even as mechanisms for oversight and investigation sputtered to life, it was a halting effort as most Republicans seemed content to allow the controversy to blow over. Meanwhile, Democrats slammed the Signal chat as a reckless violation of secrecy that could have put service members in harm’s way.

“This put pilots at risk because of sloppiness and carelessness,” said Sen. Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat and former fighter pilot.

Kelly and other Democrats have called for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to either resign or be fired. “If this was an officer in the military — at any level — or enlisted person, they would have been fired already,” Kelly said.

Asked by a reporter on Wednesday about the call by Wicker, of Mississippi, and Reed, of Rhode Island, for an inspector general probe at the Pentagon, Trump replied, “It doesn’t bother me.”

Wicker, whose support was crucial to Hegseth’s Senate confirmation, is one of the most ardent defense hawks in Congress and has said the committee will request a classified hearing with a top administration official, as well as for the administration to verify the contents of the Signal chat. The contents, which were published by The Atlantic, show that Hegseth listed weapons systems and a timeline for the attack on Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen earlier this month.

Senate Republicans have criticized the discussion on Signal but have stopped short of calling for the removal of Hegseth or anyone else involved.

Sen. Mike Rounds, a Republican member of both the Senate Intelligence and Armed Services committees, said that any oversight should be done “in a bipartisan way.”

Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he wants to check the phones of those involved in the Signal chat for malware as well as whether Hegseth had shared military plans on other Signal chats.

Warner said he expected support from Republicans, but so far his Republican counterpart on the intelligence committee, Sen. Tom Cotton, has not indicated his stance.

FBI Director Kash Patel was not part of a Signal chat in which other Trump administration national security officials discussed detailed attack plans, but that didn’t spare him from being questioned by lawmakers this week about whether the nation’s premier law enforcement agency would investigate.

Patel made no such commitments during the course of two days of Senate and House hearings, declining to comment on the possibility and testifying that he had not personally reviewed the text messages that were inadvertently shared on an unclassified Signal chat.

Trump insists the matter is “not really an FBI thing,” however, the Justice Department has handled investigations into the mishandling of classified or sensitive information by both Republican and Democratic administrations for decades. The Justice Department does have broad discretion to open an investigation, but the mood from Patel showed that under Trump it would likely stay on the sidelines.

When asked at an unrelated news conference what the Justice Department plans to do, Attorney General Pam Bondi deflected, saying the mission was ultimately a success.

Echoing the White House, Bondi also insisted that none of the information shared on Signal was classified, even though officials have provided no evidence that that’s the case. Espionage Act statutes require the safe handling of closely held national defense information even if it’s not marked classified.

Bondi, who has pledged not to play politics with the department, quickly pivoted to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former President Joe Biden, who were investigated for allegations that they mishandled classified information but were not charged. Both Democrats were subject to extensive criminal investigations, and the FBI and the Justice Department have long track records of such inquiries.

In civil court, a lawsuit filed by the group American Oversight against several Trump administration officials and the National Archives and Records Administration alleges they violated federal record-keeping laws.

That only further inflamed Trump’s ire at the judiciary, especially when the case was randomly assigned Wednesday to U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who was already presiding over a case challenging the deportation of Venezuelan migrants under wartime powers. In that case, the Trump administration just this week invoked the “state secrets” privilege to refuse to share details with the judge about the timing of deportation flights to El Salvador.

Trump early Thursday declared it “disgraceful” that Boasberg had been assigned the case in the Washington court.

“There is no way for a Republican, especially a TRUMP REPUBLICAN, to win before him,” Trump said. He added that Boasberg, who was nominated by President Barack Obama, a Democrat, is “Highly Conflicted.” Trump and his allies have called for impeaching Boasberg.

The White House National Security Council has also said it would investigate the Signal chat. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Thursday that she had no update on the status of that investigation.

“We’ve been incredibly transparent about this entire situation, and we will continue to be,” Leavitt said.

Credit: NYT

Credit: NYT