Watch Live: Top Trump officials prove global threat in group chat questions about text

Washington – U.S. intelligence agency leaders testified to global security threats on the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday It was revealed Trump’s top official accidentally included a reporter in a small group chat that introduced the highly sensitive U.S. plan to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen.

Sen. Mark Warner, Virginia, the committee's top Democrat, raised a controversy at the top of the hearing, calling it “incredible” that intelligence officials in the chat on the encrypted messaging app App Signal did not want to check on others.

“Are these government devices? Are they personal devices? Are the devices collected to ensure there is no malware?” Warner said in his opening speech. “There is a lot of decrypted information that our rivals China and Russia are trying to break into encryption systems like signals.”

On Monday, Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg revealed that he was added to a group chat on the encrypted messaging app signals about the war plan. Goldberg said the account appears to be that the National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe both participated in the Message Thread.

Both Gabbard and Ratcliffe testified to the committee, FBI Director Kash Patel, NSA Director General Timothy Haugh and Defense Intelligence Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse.

In a group chat initiated by President Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz, Goldberg wrote that Ratcliffe shared “information that could be interpreted as relevant to actual and current intelligence operations.”

The National Security Council said in a statement to CBS News on Monday that the message threads “seem to be real.”

Both Gabbard and Ratcliffe denied sharing confidential information in a craziest exchange with Warner. Facing Warner’s people, Gabbard initially refused to say whether she was part of the chat.

“Because this is all classified?” Warner said.

“Because it is under review,” Gabbard replied.

“If there is no classification, share the text immediately,” Warner said.

Ratcliffe confirmed to Warner that he was a participant in the message thread, but the decision to delay communication using signals was a security mistake. Ratcliffe said the signal was on his CIA computer when he was identified as a director earlier this year. “Just like most CIA officials,” he said, who believes commercial applications “allow” for work.

“Like most CIA officials,” he said, the agency believes that commercial applications “allow” for work use and were used during the Biden administration.

“Any decisions provided by the Senator can also be recorded through formal channels,” Ratcliffe said. “It is obvious that in the signal message group, my communication is completely permitted and legal, without containing confidential information.”

Ratcliffe then told New Mexico Democratic Senator Martin Heinrich that the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Bureau recommended “high-level officials who are targeted by foreign opponents as much as possible” to use “apps that are as end-to-end encrypted as possible.”

Goldberg reported that the spy chief also denied that the conversation included information about weapons packages, targets or strike times.

“I don't know,” Ratcliffe said.

In an interrogation by Sen. Ron Wyden, Democratic Oregon, both Ratcliffe and Gabbard denied participating in any signal group chats, sharing classified information.

Gabbard told Wyden she had “no objection” to work with the audit to confirm the situation, while Ratcliffe said he would comply with what the National Security Council considers appropriate follow-up.

also Democrats focus on group chatthe hearing is expected to focus on the threat posed by China, Russia and Iran.

“Many of the threats we face do exist,” said Sen. Tom Cotton, the Republican chairman of the committee, in his opening speech.

Intelligence officials will also testify to the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday. The hearing was released along with the annual threat assessment from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

The 2024 report says the United States faces an “increasingly fragile global order” next year, which will be plagued by strong competition for power, regional conflicts and transnational challenges.

At last year’s Senate hearing on global threats, top intelligence officials in the Biden administration stressed that U.S. aid to Ukraine is necessary to resist the survival of the Russian invasion, and that U.S. support for Ukraine also sent a deterrent message to China as it stares at Thailand.

Mr. Trump, who had run for Trump to end the Ukrainian war, was more friendly to Russia and temporarily suspended intelligence sharing and security aid after arguing with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's Oval Office.

He recently declined to comment on whether the United States will prevent China from seizing Taiwan by force during its presidency.

Mr. Trump also put pressure on Iran to negotiate a new nuclear deal, warning that potential military action might otherwise be taken.