April 5, 2025 Editor, The News-Gazette: Regarding the “Signalgate” scandal, common sense tells us information concerning imminent military action by U.S. forces must be held in secure government channels and never on commercial apps like Signal. The success or failure of a mission and the lives of U.S. personnel depend on this fundamental fact, yet the opinions of Sen. Mark Warner and Congressman Ben Cline on this issue are starkly different.
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Warner noted none of the chat participants were held accountable but “any rank-and-file military or intelligence officer who so carelessly jeopardized our national security would lose his security clearance and his job.”
Warner wondered if the phones used in the chat had been checked for malware, knowing that our international adversaries have successfully targeted U.S. officials’ devices. The senator also mentioned the damage this chat may have done to intelligence- sharing relationships with allies. Warner related he got an “earful” from families of personnel deployed on the carrier USS Harry S. Truman that conducted the strikes against Yemen (the topic of the Signal chat), saying they had a “right to be angry and a right for some answers.”
In contrast, Ben Cline evidently thinks the whole thing is some sort of anti-Trump conspiracy. Asked by Steve Bannon on “War Room” for his assessment, Cline called “Signalgate” “a lot of noise” which “the media was spinning up.” When Bannon observed that “it looks like a coordinated deep state Democrat intelligence Community ambush,” Cline replied “that does give me concern.”
Cline sits on the House Intelligence Committee’s National Security and Cyber Subcommittee which is responsible for oversight of intelligence in the electronic spectrum, including cyber-defense. Considering the foreign intelligence collection potential from the Signal chat, Cline should be very concerned, but no, he thinks this is just “noise.” EDWARD GRIMES Lexington
