An unprecedented scandal shakes America; Does it leak or not?

The group conversation of the highest officials of the administration of President Donald Trump took place via the Signal messaging application, and the editor of the Atlantic portal Jeffrey Goldberg was allegedly included in it by mistake.

"Nobody sent messages about war plans and that's all I have to say about it. You're talking about a lying and highly discredited so-called journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg, who has made a profession out of peddling fraud," Hegseth told Fox News.

The announcement came after Goldberg said Monday that he was mistakenly added to a private conversation on Signal where Trump administration officials were discussing plans to attack Yemen.

Despite Hegseth's claims, the group conversation was confirmed by the White House.

"This appears to be an authentic chain of messages, and we are looking into how an unintended number of people were added to the chain ... The ongoing success of the operation against the Houthis demonstrates that there was no threat to troops or national security," National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said in a statement.

According to Goldberg, on March 11, four days before the US military strike on Yemen, he received a message from a user named Michael Waltz, and after accepting the request, he found himself in a group chat called the "Houthi PC Small Group" (PC refers to the General Committee, America's national security decision-making body).

The US President launched military action against the Houthis on March 15, due to the militants' attack on ships sailing through the Red Sea.

Goldberg said he received information about plans for military action through a mail group hours before the action began.

According to him, it was about information about military objectives, weapons that will be used in the action, as well as about the sequence of military strikes.

National Security Adviser Michael Waltz allegedly accidentally added Goldberg to a group conversation that also included Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard as the group discussed highly classified plans for military action in Yemen and other highly sensitive issues.

The chat messages detailed the planning and discussion of the March 15 attack on Yemen, leading Goldberg to conclude that the group was real.

Trump later denied knowledge of the incident.

"I don't know anything about that. I'm not a big fan of The Atlantic. To me, it's a magazine that's going out of business. It's not much of a magazine. But I don't know anything about that," he said at the briefing.

Legal experts interviewed by The Atlantic suggest that Waltz's actions may constitute a violation of laws governing the handling of national defense information.