The Signalgate Scandal and What it Says About Trump's ME Policy

Repost from MintPress

The Press is already calling it Signalgate, harkening back to the infamous political scandal in 1972 under the Nixon administration. On Monday, March 24th the Atlantic broke the story that journalist Jeffery Goldberg had been added to a signal group chat with US national security leaders discussing impending war plans for aerial combat missions against Houthi leadership in Mid March of this year.

Classified information was discussed on an open-source civilian messaging application. While Signal is used by military leaders around the world, according to Signal’s CEO, it is against the PEntagon’s operational security protocols.

Using a Signal chat to share highly classified information and accidentally including a reporter on the discussion could raise the possibility of violations of federal laws such as the Espionage Act.

It can be a crime to mishandle, misuse or abuse classified information, though it is unclear whether such provisions might have been breached in this case. However, the salient point here is that they were using an app with disappearing messages, a feature not available on secure governmental messaging systems where accountability is a priority.

Join us tonight on State of Play to do a deep dive into this budding scandal, and what it means for both the administration and for Yemen.