Pentagon watchdog investigates if staffers were asked to delete Hegseth’s Signal messages

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon’s watchdog is looking into whether any of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s aides were asked to delete Signal messages that may have shared sensitive military information with a reporter, according to two people familiar with the investigation and documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

The inspector general’s request focuses on how information about the March 15 airstrikes on Houthi targets in Yemen was shared on the messaging app.

This comes as Hegseth is scheduled to testify before Congress next week for the first time since his confirmation hearing. He is likely to face questions under oath not only about his handling of sensitive information but also the wider turmoil at the Pentagon following the departures of several senior aides and an internal investigation over information leaks.

Hegseth already has faced questions over the installation of an unsecured internet line in his office that bypassed the Pentagon’s security protocols and revelations that he shared details about the military strikes in multiple Signal chats.

One of the chats included his wife and brother, while the other included President Donald Trump’s top national security officials and inadvertently included The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg.

Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson had no comment on Friday, citing the pending investigation. The inspector general’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Besides finding out whether anyone was asked to delete Signal messages, the inspector general also is asking some past and current staffers who were with Hegseth on the day of the strikes who posted the information and who had access to his phone, according to the two people familiar with the investigation and the documents reviewed by the AP. The people were not authorized to discuss the investigation and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Democratic lawmakers and a small number of Republicans have said that the information Hegseth posted to the Signal chats before the military jets had reached their targets could have put those pilots’ lives at risk and that for any lower-ranking members of the military it would have led to their firing.