Sorry, You Don’t Get To Declare ‘Case Closed’ On War Crime Planning Over Signal

Failures

from the this-case-is-far-from-closed dept

Remember when government officials discussing sensitive information over unsecured channels was treated as a national crisis worthy of endless investigations? Apparently, those days are over. While Hillary Clinton’s email server spawned years of investigations and Attorney General Pam Bondi is still trying to rehash it, the White House wants us to simply forget about top officials planning potential war crimes over Signal just last week.

The contrast is striking. Clinton’s email server triggered multiple congressional investigations, FBI probes, and years of lawsuits. Yet when it comes to senior officials casually discussing military targeting plans over a consumer messaging app, we’re told there’s nothing more to see here.

And this isn’t just about partisan hypocrisy from the “lock her up” crowd, though that’s certainly on display. This is about national security officials casually planning military operations over a consumer messaging app — operations that may constitute war crimes in their targeting of civilian objects. The only reason we even know about this massive security breach is their stunning incompetence in adding Atlantic journalist Jeffrey Goldberg to their illegal chat group.

Even some top Republicans recognize this deserves serious investigation. But the White House has other plans.

The White House’s response? A dismissive wave of the hand and a “case closed” declaration from press secretary Karoline Leavitt:

“This case has been closed here at the White House as far as we are concerned,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Monday. “There have been steps made to ensure that something like that can obviously never happen again, and we’re moving forward,” she said.

And much of the media seems content to simply parrot this talking point:

Let’s be clear: uncritically reporting the White House’s “nothing to see here” stance isn’t journalism — it’s stenography. The press secretary’s statement isn’t just meaningless, it’s an active attempt to sweep serious actual violations under the rug.

This White House’s strategy is clear: lie, mislead, and deflect until the story dies. We’ve seen it with Bondi’s desperate “but her emails” deflection last week, and we’re seeing it again with this premature “case closed” declaration.

But there are plenty of things in this story that require investigation:

• How did multiple senior officials decide it was totally acceptable to plan military operations over a consumer messaging app?
• What other sensitive discussions have happened on unsecured channels such as Signal?
• Have these conversations been recorded, as required under the Federal Records Act?
• Have other illegal commercial chats been scrubbed to see how many outsiders were allowed in to them like Goldberg was?
• How did they fuck up so badly to add an external person (incredibly, a reporter) to this illegal chat?
• Who approved targeting civilian infrastructure, and what was their legal justification?
• What “steps have been made” to prevent this from happening again, and why should we trust them?

The media’s job isn’t to parrot White House talking points — it’s to uncover the truth. And the truth here is explosive: top government officials casually planned what appear to be war crimes over an unsecured channel, and we only know about it because they accidentally included a journalist in their illegal discussions.

If the White House (and Congress) won’t investigate, then the media must. The administration clearly doesn’t care if we know they’re wielding national security laws as political weapons while ignoring actual security breaches. But the public should care deeply about this cynical abuse of power. When national security becomes just another partisan cudgel, we’re not just undermining the rule of law — we’re creating a system where real threats to national security go uninvestigated while manufactured scandals consume years of attention and resources.

Filed Under: investigations, jeffrey goldberg, karoline leavitt, mike waltz, pete hegseth, signal chat, signalgate, war crimes
Companies: signal