XPost: alt.politics.media, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, sac.politics
XPost: alt.society.liberalism, talk.politics.misc
The Democrats' latest effort to manufacture a Trump administration scandal
blew up in their faces this week after Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief
of The Atlantic, reported that he was somehow included in an encrypted
Signal chat group with top administration officials discussing a planned
attack on Houthi rebels in Yemen. According to Goldberg, officials
discussed classified and/or top-secret war plans.
No one disputes that Goldberg was erroneously included in the chat, but
the real issue is whether classified or top-secret war plans were actually discussed.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe and DNI Director Tulsi Gabbard testified that nothing classified or top secret was discussed in the chat. Others in the administration have said the same thing.
Goldberg had been given the opening to release the chats in their entirety
to prove them wrong. But he insisted that he wouldn’t.
During an interview on The Bulwark Podcast with Tim Miller, Goldberg
repeatedly evaded calls to produce evidence, raising serious questions
about the credibility of his claims.
Miller directly challenged Goldberg, pointing out that top Trump
administration officials had accused him of lying. “Now, the Secretary of Defense and the White House Press Secretary have said you’re lying, have
said there are no war plans there, have said there’s no classified information,” Miller stated. “So the obvious question is, shouldn’t you
now demonstrate it? Shouldn’t you publish the text?”
Goldberg flatly refused. “No, because they’re wrong. They’re wrong,” he insisted, offering no proof to back up his claims.
Here's the problem with that claim: In the encrypted chat, National
Security Advisor Michael Waltz explicitly mentioned the participants'
“high side” inboxes, a reference to the classified system. This made it
clear they knew certain topics couldn’t be discussed on the Signal
platform.
Miller pressed Goldberg further in the interview, asking whether he would
at least provide the alleged messages to congressional intelligence
committees. Instead of responding substantively, Goldberg deflected with sarcasm. “Wow. What? You wanna become my lawyer?” he quipped with an
annoyed tone. He clearly wasn’t comfortable with the line of questioning,
and I got the sense he was hiding something.
As the conversation continued, Goldberg struggled to justify his refusal
to produce evidence, resorting to vague justifications. “Just because
they’re irresponsible with material doesn’t mean that I’m gonna be irresponsible with this material,” he said. He further attempted to cast
doubt on the administration’s credibility, suggesting officials were
merely trying to “get out of a jam.”
In a final attempt to defend his decision, Goldberg framed it as a matter
of principle. “I have a pretty clear standard in my own behavior of what I consider… information that I consider to be in the public interest, even
if it’s technically classified or not,” he said, adding that he was
“sticking to my principles.”
Yet on Wednesday, Goldberg published the full chat after all. He went from insisting he was being responsible by not publishing the full chat to publishing it while claiming that in doing so, he was proving the Trump administration was mischaracterizing the sensitivity of the chats.
Goldberg went against his self-proclaimed “principles” when he published
the chat. If he truly felt it contained top secret or classified
information, the principles he claims to hold dear would have kept him
from releasing it. By releasing the chat in full, he proved his entire narrative about the situation was a hoax.
Goldberg’s actions only undermined his claims, revealing he was lying
about top-secret or classified information being discussed. The content of
the chat reveals no war plans or classified details, just a discussion
weighing the pros and cons of striking now versus waiting. It’s a
conversation among cabinet members and staffers on the best way to move forward.
After this weekend, this non-story will be just a memory, and Goldberg
will move on to making other false accusations against the Trump administration. Remember, this is the same guy who has a history of
publishing fake stories about President Trump.
https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2025/03/26/jeffrey-goldberg-just-proved- his-signalgate-narrative-is-a-hoax-n4938288
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