WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump stood behind his controversial Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth Monday despite a new scandal over his reported use of messaging app Signal to discuss air strikes on Yemen with his wife and others.
"He's doing a great job," Trump said, dismissing the reports as "just fake news."
US media reported that Hegseth used Signal to talk about the air strikes against Yemen's Huthi rebels with people not usually involved in such discussions, just weeks after it emerged that he also shared details about the strikes in another Signal chat to which a journalist had been inadvertently added.
The scandals and reports of turmoil inside the Pentagon are a blow to the newly minted defense secretary, a former Fox News co-host nominated by Trump despite having no high-level military experience and no background in running large organisations.
However, Hegseth was defiant, blaming the media.
"This is what the media does. They take anonymous sources from disgruntled former employees and then they try to slash and burn people and ruin their reputations," Hegseth said at the White House, adding: "Not going to work with me."
Multiple Democratic lawmakers have said it is time for Hegseth to go.
"Trump's Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has now leaked classified military plans TWICE -- this time through a unsecured Signal chat on a personal device to friends and family. He's a walking national security disaster and needs to resign or be fired," said Representative Jim McGovern.
Senators Mark Warner, Andy Kim and Elissa Slotkin all called for Hegseth to quit, with the latter saying: "If he cared about the institution he's leading, he should man up, acknowledge he's a distraction to the military's mission, and resign."
New chat included Hegseth's wife, brother and lawyer
After NPR radio reported that the White House had begun looking for a new defense chief, Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt posted on X that this was "total FAKE NEWS based on one anonymous source who clearly has no idea what they are talking about."
Last month, The Atlantic magazine revealed that its editor-in-chief was mistakenly included in a Signal chat in which officials including Hegseth and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz discussed the March 15 Yemen strikes.
The revelation sparked an uproar, with Trump's administration forced on the defensive over the leak. A Pentagon inspector general's probe into Hegseth's use of Signal is ongoing.
The New York Times and CNN then reported Sunday that Hegseth had shared information on the same strikes in a second Signal group chat. The details shared included the flight schedules for warplanes targeting the Huthis, the Times reported.
The chat included his wife Jennifer, who is a journalist and former Fox News producer, as well as his brother Phil and lawyer Tim Parlatore, both of whom serve in roles at the Pentagon, the newspaper and the channel said, citing anonymous sources.
The reported release of military information in the chat follows upheaval at the top of the Pentagon, with three senior officials removed last week amid an investigation into alleged leaks.
Former senior advisors Darin Selnick, Dan Caldwell and Colin Carroll hit back on Sunday, saying Pentagon officials had "slandered our character with baseless attacks."
"We still have not been told what exactly we were investigated for, if there is still an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation of 'leaks' to begin with," they said in a joint statement posted on social media.
Hegseth's former Pentagon press secretary John Ullyot also took aim at him in a scathing opinion piece on Sunday that described "a month of total chaos at the Pentagon."
"President Donald Trump has a strong record of holding his top officials to account. Given that, it's hard to see Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth remaining in his role for much longer," wrote Ullyot.
