Republicans expressed some mixed reactions Wednesday after The Atlantic released more screenshots from a group chat on Signal that involved top Trump officials after the magazine's editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, was inadvertently added to the conversation.
“I think President Trump has handled this matter well. Further, I believe that all the participants in the chat were under the impression they were using an appropriate and secure form of communication. This will also fall into the category of 'lessons learned'," said U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) in a statement. “However, recent revelations about the content of the texts — while not discussing war plans per se — do in fact detail very sensitive information about a planned and ongoing military operation.”
Graham ended the statement by saying he continues to support all members of President Donald Trump’s national security team.
Sen. Roger Wicker, the Republican chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he and Sen. Jack Reed, the committee’s top Democrat, will send a letter to the Trump administration requesting an Inspector General investigation into the use of Signal by top national security officials to discuss military plans.
Wicker is also calling for a classified Senate briefing from a top national security official and verification that The Atlantic published an accurate transcript of the Signal chat.
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Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said in part, "... this clearly was a, this is something you need to own up to and fix and ensure that it doesn't happen again.”
Scripps News Group Congressional Correspondent Nate Reed and Producer Sam Lisker showed some members of Congress on Capitol Hill the screenshots from The Atlantic in real time.
In the hallways this AM, @ReedReports showed Senate Republicans a screenshot obtained by @TheAtlantic of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's messages from a Signal group chat on impending military strikes.
— Sam Lisker (@slisker) March 26, 2025
Several refused to read them.
Watch ⬇️ @scrippsnews pic.twitter.com/NdhJFEaHe8
After looking at them, Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) defended Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth after looking at the screenshots and said, “He thought he was speaking to his fellow cabinet members. He should not resign.”
The Trump administration doubled down on its claims Wednesday that the information in the group chat was not classified.
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Hegseth said in a post on X that the additional messages published by The Atlantic included, “No names. No targets. No locations. No units. No routes. No sources. No methods. And no classified information.”
However, the exchange revealed the precise timing of attacks and the assets involved on March 15 — just before the U.S. culminated the attack, according to Goldberg.
