Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH) told ABC’s Martha Raddatz Sunday that the information discussed by Trump cabinet officials in an unsecured commercial app earlier this month should have been “considered classified.”
The Trump administration has said details of a strike in Yemen mistakenly shared with The Atlantic‘s Jeffrey Goldberg were sensitive but that nothing was classified.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz were among numerous Trump cabinet officials who discussed striking Houthi targets in Yemen.
All have denied playing loose with classified materials while Hegseth claimed what was discussed with Goldberg in tow did not equate to an attack plan.
On Sunday’s edition of This Week, Turner told Raddatz everything that was discussed should have been considered classified.
Turner told Raddatz that despite those who discussed the details of the strikes not verifying who was in another Signal group chat, “The operation itself was not impacted.”
The lawmaker added he had requested “an inspector general investigation into this matter, the use of Signal, and to the issue of whether or not classified information was used, the source of the information in the Signal discussion.”
Raddatz then asked, “Do you think this – that some of those messages, particularly ones Pete Hegseth sent, were classified?”
Turner replied:
Well, clearly, the subject matter that’s being discussed, the status of ongoing military operations, should be – and considered classified information. And the – and it’s surprising to find it in an unclassified manner, to find it in this way is surprising.
After Turner and Raddatz went back and forth as to whether the Ohio Republican was playing “word games,” Turner criticized Goldberg’s reporting of the chat.
“But in that, The Atlantic and Goldberg really did oversell,” he said. “They really did lose some – some credibility.”
Watch the clip above via ABC News.
The post GOP Congressman Says the Info in the Leaked Signal Chat Clearly ‘Should Be Considered Classified’ — Amid Trump Admin Denials That it Was first appeared on Mediaite.
