Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly skirted Pentagon rules to install an unsecure internet connection in his office so he could use Signal.
His prolific use of the unclassified messaging app has generated intense scrutiny after it was revealed that he allegedly shared sensitive military intel in at least two group chats.
Two sources familiar with the situation told the Associated Press that Hegseth’s “dirty line”—which routes directly into public internet—raises alarms that any information shared over the line could have been compromised by hackers or foreign surveillance networks.
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The setup was seemingly against the Pentagon’s security policy, yet Hegseth appears to have gone out of his way to set up the system, according to a report by The Washington Post Thursday.
Three sources alleged to the outlet that Hegseth “cloned” the Signal app from his personal phone after asking his aides how to bypass a lack of cell signal in the Pentagon.
According to the sources, Hegseth then had Signal installed on a second computer in his Pentagon office, with the aim to send messages to his Signal chats from the device.
Sean Parnell, a defense department spokesman, told the Post that Hegseth “has never used and does not currently use Signal on his government computer.”
The report adds another layer to an intensifying discussion over Hegseth’s fitness for the Pentagon’s top job. The first “Signalgate”—which saw the leaking of sensitive bombing plans to The Atlantic’s Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg in a Signal chat—has reportedly plunged the Department of Defense into chaos.
It was later revealed that Hegseth held a second secret Signal chat where he discussed more military intel with his lawyer, his brother Phil and wife Jennifer Rauchet.
Following a slew of negative headlines, Hegseth oversaw a purge of his handpicked top aides—including Dan Caldwell, Colin Carroll, Darin Selnick, and his chief of staff Joe Kasper, who announced his exit from the Pentagon Thursday.
The former Fox News host’s chaotic tenure has resulted in condemnation from both Republicans and Democrats, yet Hegseth has insisted that he “won’t blink” in the face of calls to resign.
He also insisted that there had been no discussion of war plans in the chat with his wife.
“President Trump asked me to bring warfighting back to the Pentagon every single day, right? That is our focus, and if people don’t like it, they can come after me,” he said in an interview with Fox News earlier this week. “I haven’t blinked, and I won’t blink because this job is too big and too important.”
