The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg Yemen war plans texts, explained

The second presidency of Donald Trump has already been filled with notable mishaps, from a presidential portrait despised by the subject himself to his forgetfulness when required to place his hand on the Bible when swearing the official oath. We’ve become so accustomed to these Veep-like snafus (remember the garbage truck moment?) that we almost began to assume nothing out of this administration could truly shock us, at least until this week.

In between a deluge of other headlines, we learned of a glaring (and somewhat hilarious, if it weren’t for the implications) mistake made by Trump’s Secretary of Defence, Pete Hegseth. The mistake involved a group chat, a journalist for The Atlantic, and plans for airstrikes in the country of Yemen. “Make it make sense!”, you might be asking. Well, let me give it a try. 

Pete Hegseth accidentally texted Jeffrey Goldberg sensitive information. 

BREAKING: The Trump admin accidentally texted a journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg, from The Atlantic, their top-secret war plans on Yemen.

Texts are below between Vance and Hegseth, in which the journalist was included.

Imagine if Biden did this! So incompetent. pic.twitter.com/CGIkNq0iNX

— Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) March 24, 2025

The whole hullabaloo kicked off on March 24, when The Atlantic ran with a story that had the headline “The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans”. In it, author Jeffery Goldberg claimed that he was made aware of Hegseth’s plans to launch airstrikes against Houthi militants in Yemen two hours before those strikes occurred, because he was accidentally part of a group chat in which Hegseth discussed them. 

According to the article, the group chat Goldberg was added to was named “Houthi PC small group”, and and took place on Signal, an encrypted messaging service widely believed to be more secure than other commercial texting applications. Naturally, Goldberg’s involvement in the group chat raised questions around the Trump administration’s decision to distribute classified information so nonchalantly, especially since the text thread contained sensitive details like “precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing” relating to the airstrike, according to Goldberg.

After Secretary Hegseth argued “nobody was texting war plans,” The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg responds: “That’s a lie. He was texting war plans, he was texting attack plans.”

“When targets were going to targeted. How they were going to be targeted. Who was at the targets. When… pic.twitter.com/cKYh5NOIW7

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) March 25, 2025

Alongside the journalist, the text thread also reportedly included Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, national security adviser Michael Waltz, and other prominent officials in the Trump administration. Goldberg said that he initially thought the text chain was fake or part of a “disinformation campaign,” but eventually came to realize it was “almost certainly real.” He then left the group chat.   

The White House said it is responding to the apparent information breach.

Reporter: Why were those details shared on signal?

Pete Hegseth: Nobody was texting war plans.

Fact-check: False. @Acyn pic.twitter.com/0fYILdWNx7

— The Intellectualist (@highbrow_nobrow) March 25, 2025

In the wake of the snafu, the White House shared a statement claiming it would be investigating how Goldberg was able to accidently gain access to such sensitive information, well before it became public knowledge. “At this time, the message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain,” the National Security Council said in a statement.

For his part, Trump told reporters that he wasn’t aware of the text chat debacle, but then took to social media to endorse an X post from Elon Musk that made fun of The Atlantic. Hegseth, meanwhile, described Goldberg as a “so-called journalist” and claimed “nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that.”

Goldberg’s position at The Atlantic makes his access to the chat all-the-more worrisome. 

Trump responds to officials in his administration accidentally including @TheAtlantic EIC Jeffrey Goldberg in a group chat that discussed war plans in Yemen:

“I don’t know anything about it. I’m not a big fan of The Atlantic. To me, it’s a magazine that’s going out of business.” pic.twitter.com/IBatWwW1a1

— The Recount (@therecount) March 24, 2025

It would be one thing if Goldberg were a low-level journalist with less swing at The Atlantic, but his high-ranking role at the publication makes the mistake all-the-more glaring. Goldberg is currently the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, and serves as the publication’s senior national security and foreign affairs journalist.

Prior to that, Goldberg was a Middle Eastern and Washington correspondent for publications like The Washington Post, The Jerusalem Post, The New York Times Magazine and The New Yorker.