A highly anticipated report from the Defense Department’s inspector general found that Secretary Pete Hegseth endangered troops when he sent detailed information regarding the quantity and timing of U.S. strikes over hostile territory using a messaging application on his personal cell phone.
The report, released Thursday but made available to congressional offices earlier this week, was requested by Senate Armed Services Chair Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and ranking member Jack Reed, D-R.I., after news broke in March that a journalist from The Atlantic had been inadvertently added to a Cabinet-level group chat in which U.S. strikes on Houthi forces in Yemen were planned and then discussed in real time.
The release, coming at a time when Hegseth is under intense scrutiny for his role in a Sept. 2 so-called double-tap strike against an alleged drug-carrying vessel, caused some Democratic lawmakers to call for his immediate ouster. Reaction among Republicans was more circumspect.
The watchdog found that Hegseth risked compromising sensitive information — in this case namely the exact timing of when U.S. forces would be undertaking their missions — by sending information through Signal, a commercially available messaging application.
Hegseth also violated Pentagon policy by not retaining records of the group chat, named “Houthi PC Small Group,” because some of the messages were auto-deleted. As a result, the watchdog was forced to rely in part on the transcript of the chat posted by The Atlantic.
The chat also included then-National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, Vice President JD Vance, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and Secretary of State Marco Rubio .
In the chat, Hegseth provided a detailed timeline, down to the minute, of the strikes in Yemen and specified the aircraft being used, all while expressing confidence that “we are currently clean on OPSEC,” according to screenshots published by The Atlantic.
Hegseth declined to be interviewed by the inspector general, and instead provided written information. Hegseth wrote that he is the “original classification authority,” meaning he has ultimate authority to decide whether information should be classified.
The report noted that the information Hegseth shared was classified as “SECRET and not releasable to foreign nationals (SECRET//NOFORN)” when he received it via email from the commander of U.S. Central Command, which was carrying out the strikes.
The IG found that while it was true that Hegseth had the discretion to declassify information at will, his use of Signal on a personal phone to send nonpublic information still violated Pentagon policy.
On Wednesday, the Pentagon characterized the report as clearing Hegseth of wrongdoing.
“The Inspector General review is a TOTAL exoneration of Secretary Hegseth and proves what we knew all along — no classified information was shared,” Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement. “This matter is resolved, and the case is closed.”
In a Thursday statement, Wicker said it was clear that Hegseth “acted within his authority to communicate the information in question to other cabinet level officials.” But the lawmaker made no mention of how that information was communicated — the crux of the IG’s findings.
“It is also clear to me that our senior leaders need more tools available to them to communicate classified information in real time and a variety of environments. I think we have some work to do in providing those tools to our national security leaders,” Wicker said.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said during a CNN interview Wednesday that he agreed Hegseth put troops at risk by transmitting sensitive information over Signal.
Responding to Hegseth’s attempt to paint the report as “total exoneration,” Tillis urged Hegseth to just “take the learning experience and move on. No one can rationalize that as an exoneration.”
Outcry from Democrats
Other lawmakers were far less forgiving.
In a statement of his own, Reed said the report confirmed that Hegseth “violated military regulations and continues to show reckless disregard for the safety of American servicemembers.”
“This report validates the serious concerns I hold about Secretary Hegseth’s judgment, competence, and fitness to lead our nation’s military. I urge Secretary Hegseth to explain himself to Congress, the public, and the servicemembers he leads,” Reed said.
Reed also took issue with how Hegseth handled the issue after news of the group chat became public.
“For months, Secretary Hegseth has attempted to mislead Congress and the American people, claiming repeatedly that no classified information was involved. The Inspector General has now definitively cast doubt on those false assurances,” Reed said.
“While the report notes that Secretary Hegseth has declassification authority, it fails to explain why he believed it appropriate or necessary to declassify and share sensitive battlefield information on an unsecured commercial platform with unauthorized recipients, including family members and his personal attorney. It is also clear that he did not follow established procedures for declassification that apply to every other classification official throughout the Department.”
House Armed Services Committee ranking member Adam Smith, D-Wash., said in a statement that the report was a “damning review of an incompetent secretary of defense who is profoundly incapable of the job and clearly has no respect for or comprehension of what is required to safeguard our service members.”
Other Democrats demanded that he resign or be fired immediately.
“To be blunt, Hegseth is a walking national security threat. How many more times does Secretary Hegseth have to put our military in danger before Republicans say enough is enough?” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., a member of the Armed Services panel, said in a statement.
Sen. Chris Coons, ranking member of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, said any servicemember who “acted with such disregard for our national security would be dismissed, at the very least. Our nation’s highest ranking defense official should not be held to a lower standard than the men and women he oversees. For the good of our nation, I once again call on Secretary Hegseth to resign.”
And Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., who serves on the Armed Services and Intelligence panels, said in a statement that she “opposed his confirmation in January because I knew he was manifestly unfit to lead our armed forces, and he continues to drive that point home every day.”
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