Some of Donald Trump’s most ardent backers are voicing frustration with his team’s refusal to admit fault over the Signal intelligence breach, a rare crack in the president’s wall of support.
Trump’s demand for loyalty above all else has been a defining feature of his political career, even more so in his second White House term. Until this week, his fellow Republicans have largely fallen in line, even as he pushed the limits of his presidential powers, wrested some spending authority from Congress and demolished former sacred cows for US conservatives, such as free trade.
Yet the disclosure of US military attack plans — and the White House’s bombastic cleanup effort — has proved too much to bear for some of the president’s allies. The crisis, now in its fourth day, has triggered an outcry from Republican members of Congress, GOP strategists, online influencers and friendly media figures, even Dave Portnoy of Barstool Sports, who have grown weary of a crisis they say is of the Trump team’s own making.
“Trying to wordsmith the hell outta this signal debacle is making it worse,” Tomi Lahren, the Fox Nation host and strident conservative commentator, wrote on X. “It was bad. And I’m honestly getting sick of the whataboutisms from my own side.”
Lahren’s comment was just one of a growing chorus among Republicans who have joined Democrats in voicing anger over the incident, in which someone — apparently White House National Security Advisor Michael Waltz — inadvertently added the top editor of The Atlantic to a Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi militants in Yemen.
It wasn’t even that mistake, according to some Republicans, that was the problem. Rather, they said, it was the refusal by Trump or other top officials on the chat to admit they’d done anything wrong, even after The Atlantic published a transcript of the group chat among the top officials.
Those texts included a message in which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sent detailed timing for the attack as well as the weapons — F-18 fighter jets, drones and Tomahawk missiles — that would be deployed. National security experts said the information could have endangered the lives of American service members if seen by foreign adversaries.
“Two of the keys to credibility are to never deny the undeniable and never defend the indefensible,” said Whit Ayres, a Republican strategist. “Multiple members of the administration have been doing both over the last 48 hours.”
“If you’re going to say something at least make it believable,” Ayers said.
The rift has the potential to cause political problems for Trump. While the president thus far relied on executive actions to enact his agenda, he will need Congress to pass more ambitious items like a sweeping package of tax cuts.
“It is blatant disregard for the policies and the protocols that we have in place,” said GOP strategist Lisa Camooso Miller. “This is not only a breach of security, but it’s a blatant act of just incredible arrogance that we’ve never seen before in an administration.”
Most congressional Republicans have publicly stood by Trump or remained silent on the Signal breach, and there are few if any indications the episode could trigger a break on unrelated policy items. But Republicans’ patience with the president’s team could be tested in the coming days if Trump sticks by his flood-the-zone, deny-everything approach to managing crises.
Not only did the president’s team refuse to admit errors, it also went on the attack, in classic Trump style. Hegseth’s spokesman, Sean Parnell, called the reporter and other members of the media “hoax-peddlers.”
By Wednesday, the administration danced around the possibility that the episode was the result of hacking rather than a fat-finger mistake. Waltz went on Fox News Tuesday night to take responsibility for the blunder but continued to say he “for one hundred percent” didn’t know Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg and had talked to Elon Musk to get “the best technical minds looking at how this happened.”
“I know him by his horrible reputation and he really is the bottom scum of journalists,” Waltz said. “He wasn’t on my phone and we’re going to figure out how this happened.”
That approach didn’t hold up even for some of Trump’s most ardent congressional allies. Roger Wicker, the Mississippi Republican who serves as chairman of the Senate Armed Services committee, agreed with Democrats’ request to provide to lawmakers an expedited watchdog report on the incident.
“I’m not buying it,” Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota told reporters of the administration’s attempts to minimize the incident. “I don’t think it settles it to the satisfaction of a lot of people,” he said. “Own it, it happened, and say it will never happen again.”
Not Bending
The strain showed in the White House press room on Wednesday. Reporters peppered Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt with questions about the breach and she grew frustrated with the line of inquiry within minutes.
Leavitt told a reporter that she had “now been asked and answered the same question using different language multiple times” and solicited questions on other topics about the “different things possibly being implemented later today,” including auto tariffs.
She ended her briefing after less than a half hour, citing a speech by Vice President JD Vance that was due to start around that time.
“We are not going to bend in the face of this insincere outrage,” Leavitt said.
The crisis even penetrated into the world of pop culture. Barstool’s Portnoy — who said he voted for Trump last year and claimed to have turned down an administration job — assailed the president for his handling of the issue and called for Waltz to be fired.
“You can’t have the top security people in the United States with the most sensitive information in the world adding random editors of a magazine that hates Trump’s guts to a group chat talking about an attack before it happens on a terrorist group,” he said in a social media video.
--With assistance from Mario Parker, Steven T. Dennis, Eric Martin and Jamie Tarabay.
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