Trump wanted to fire Waltz, not for the Yemen war plan leak, but for having Atlantic editor's number

Former President Donald Trump briefly considered firing his national security adviser Mike Waltz over a recent leak involving plans for US military strikes in Yemen— but not for the reasons typically associated with such a breach.

Trump was more incensed by the discovery that Waltz had the personal contact of Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg than the fact that discussions about a military operation had taken place on an unclassified Signal group chat, The Guardian reported citing three people familiar with the matter.

Why Trump wanted Waltz fired

Despite the severity of the apparent leak, Trump was reportedly more agitated by the optics of a trusted aide storing the number of the Atlantic editor— a figure Trump has long derided and whose publication he frequently criticises. Trump’s focus seemed to be on the loyalty issue rather than the security lapse.

In the end, Trump decided against removing Waltz, largely to avoid what he viewed as a media victory for outlets like the Atlantic.

An iPhone glitch to blame?

Investigators determined that Goldberg’s number had been inadvertently saved on Waltz’s phone months earlier due to a series of communication missteps during the 2024 presidential campaign.

In October, Goldberg had contacted the Trump campaign about a story concerning Trump’s views on wounded service members. The email, which included Goldberg’s contact information in the signature block, was forwarded to Waltz via text message by then-campaign spokesperson Brian Hughes.

Though Waltz never responded to Goldberg, his iPhone automatically merged the journalist’s number with an existing contact, mistaking it for Hughes. That mistake, White House officials said, went unnoticed for months until Waltz attempted to add Hughes to the Signal group on March 13 and accidentally included Goldberg instead.

The revelation emerged as part of an internal White House investigation into a messaging thread named “Houthi PC small group,” where several top US officials had discussed proposed military action against Houthi targets in Yemen. The probe found that Goldberg had been accidentally added to the encrypted chat last month, triggering a forensic review by White House information technology staff.

Waltz addressed the incident publicly, telling Fox News he had never communicated with Goldberg and suggesting that the number had been “sucked” into his phone due to automated contact suggestions on his iPhone.