A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to preserve all Signal communications related to recent U.S. military strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen.
In documents obtained by Scripps News, U.S. District Court Chief Judge James Boasberg on Thursday said he isn't ordering the Trump administration to disclose details of the Signal communications but that those records, from March 11 to March 15, need to be preserved under the Federal Records Act. This is in response to a lawsuit filed by a watchdog group seeking to keep the records from being deleted.
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The court order comes after a journalist was inadvertently included in a Signal group chat with high-level Trump administration officials about the attack in Yemen. The journalist revealed he was added to the chat in an article in The Atlantic. He also published the attack plans after the Trump administration insisted that they were not "war plans" and not classified.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio — who was among those in the Signal group chat — was asked Wednesday whether he thought any of the information discussed was considered classified, and he deferred judgment.
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"Well, the Pentagon says it was not," Rubio responded. "And not only did it say it was not, they make very clear that it didn't put in danger anyone's life or the mission. There was no intelligence information."
National Security Adviser Mike Waltz has admitted to mistakenly including the journalist in the chat, taking responsibility for the blunder. However, the subsequent publication of the text messages led to additional scrutiny from lawmakers amid concerns over how sensitive information related to national security is discussed.
