Mike Waltz Steps Down as Trump's National Security Adviser Following Signal Chat Scandal
— The 'Signalgate' scandal erupted after Jeffrey Goldberg was accidentally added to a Signal chat revealing classified military plans.
National Security Adviser to President Donald Trump Mike Waltz has resigned amid a major security breach with the encrypted messaging service Signal. The episode, labeled “Signalgate,” was the inadvertent addition of Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, to a group chat talking about sensitive U.S. military operations.
In March 2025, Walter inadvertently included Goldberg on a Signal chat where top administration officials were laying out plans for airstrikes on Houthi targets in Yemen. The chat discussed classified information including particular targets and timing and weaponry for the strikes. Goldberg later claimed that he was provided with this information roughly two hours before the raid was launched.
At first, Waltz denied knowledge on how Goldberg came to be present in the chat, commenting that it might had been the result of a contact syncing issue. But he eventually did accept full blame for the blunder. President Trump initially defended Waltz as a "good man" who "learned a lesson," but internal pressures and the severity of the security breach forced him to leave.
With Waltz, his deputy Alex Wong also resigned. The administration is said to be mulling to replace Jonathan Cohen with Steve Witkoff, a special envoy with experience of Russia-Ukraine diplomacy as well as Middle East issues.
This episode has brought to the fore questions about the discussion of sensitive information using unsecured communications devices at the highest levels of the U.S. government.
