Judge Orders Preservation of Signal Messages Detailing Yemen Bombing Plans
A federal judge has ordered the United States government to preserve messages from a Signal chat involving top officials discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen, Al Jazeera reports.
The order follows a controversy sparked by the accidental inclusion of a journalist in the chat, which revealed sensitive military information.
Judge James Boasberg ruled on Thursday that the Trump administration must take steps to retain records of the Signal conversation from March 11 to March 15, the period during which the journalist from The Atlantic magazine had access to the discussion. The judge’s order aims to ensure compliance with federal records law and address concerns that the messages might be deleted.
The case stems from a filing by American Oversight, a nonprofit watchdog organization, which sought a temporary restraining order to prevent the deletion of the messages. American Oversight, which ultimately saw the messages published this week in The Atlantic, argued for their public release. The organization also pointed to The Atlantic’s report that the Signal messages were configured to automatically delete, some within a week and others within four weeks.
In its court filing, American Oversight asserted, “Defendants’ use of a non-classified commercial application even for such life-and-death matters as planning a military operation leads to the inevitable inference that Defendants must have used Signal to conduct other official government business.”
A representative for the Trump administration assured Judge Boasberg that measures were already in place to collect and preserve any remaining messages.
The use of Signal for high-level government communications became public on Monday after The Atlantic published the first article in a series by editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg. Goldberg described receiving an invitation, seemingly from National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, to join the Signal conversation. Upon joining, he found himself among accounts appearing to belong to Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Goldberg stated that he confirmed the conversation’s authenticity on March 15, when bombings discussed in the chat occurred in Yemen.
The Trump administration has responded by denying that any confidential information was released in the Signal chat.
