'Somehow got himself in': Trump adviser floats conspiracy on Fox News amid chat scandal
A top national security adviser for President Donald Trump took to Fox News on Tuesday to float a baseless conspiracy theory that a reporter inadvertently invited into a Signal group chat where officials mulled over war plans may have used nefarious means to smear the president.
President Donald Trump defended Mike Waltz as a "very good man" earlier Tuesday and said he does not need to apologize for the incident. Trump acknowledged his top officials made a mistake by using Signal to discuss war plans but downplayed its significance and insisted the information shared was not classified. He also suggested that Waltz would likely avoid using such platforms in the future.
Waltz and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have faced a mountain of criticism for using the app, and the reporter said he was invited into the group by mistake by Waltz. Waltz said Tuesday night he takes "full responsibility" for organizing the group chat to discuss airstrikes on Houthi militants in Yemen.
"I take full responsibility. I built the — I built the group," Waltz told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. "My job is to make sure everything's coordinated."
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But Waltz also floated a baseless theory — that the Atlantic journalist in question, Editor in Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, may have somehow gotten himself on the messaging chain in a scheme to denigrate Trump.
"The president expressed complete confidence in you today and his entire Cabinet," said Ingraham. "But how did a Trump-hating editor of The Atlantic end up on your Signal chat?"
"You know, Laura, I'm not a conspiracy theorist," Waltz began, before suggesting a conspiracy theory. "But of all the people out there, somehow this guy who has lied about the president, who has lied to Gold Star families, lied to their attorneys, and gone to Russia hoax, gone to just all kinds of lengths to lie and smear the president of the United States. And he's the one that somehow gets on someone's contact and then gets sucked into this group."
Goldberg has said he's met Waltz, but the Trump adviser denied the two have ever met, telling Ingraham: "No idea."
"Wouldn't know him if I bumped into him, if I saw him in a police lineup. I do now. I knew him by reputation about lying — for lying about the president over and over and over again. I can tell you for certain — certainly wasn't reaching out and talking to him at all. Why would I?"