WASHINGTON (AP) — The attempts by President Donald Trump and top leaders of his administration to downplay a security breach that revealed military strike plans in a Signal group chat including a journalist stand in stark contrast to their reaction to Hillary Clinton's use of a home server as secretary of state.
This time, they've largely focused their ire not on sweeping potential security lapses, or punishments as a result, but on the journalist who was errantly added to the group text and reported on it: editor-in-chief for The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg. Some of the text's participants who spoke out against Clinton haven't commented publicly at all about the Signal leak.
Click to Gallery
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, joined at right by CIA Director John Ratcliffe, answer questions as the Senate Intelligence Committee holds its worldwide threats hearing, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, center, is flanked by FBI Director Kash Patel, left, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, as the Senate Intelligence Committee holds its worldwide threats hearing, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller speaks to reporters at the White House in Washington, Monday, March 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
President Donald Trump, right, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio attend a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, Monday, March 24, 2025. (Pool via AP)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth does a television interview outside the White House, Friday, March 21, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
FILE - White House National Security Adviser Mike Waltz listens to a question from a reporter in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, in Washington, Feb. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, file)
President Donald Trump attends a reception celebrating Greek Independence Day in the East Room of the White House, Monday, March 24, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
One of the chief concerns about Clinton’s email server was that it was insecure, and that sensitive information could fall into the wrong hands. But former FBI Director James Comey said in recommending that no charges be brought against Clinton that there was no evidence that her email account had been hacked by hostile actors.
Trump insisted Tuesday that no classified information was divulged in the group chat, though Goldberg wrote that messaging revealed “precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing” of strikes in Yemen. The White House’s National Security Council has said it is investigating.
For her part, Clinton's reaction to Goldberg's reporting was one of astonishment: “You have got to be kidding me,” Clinton said in an X post that spotlighted The Atlantic article and included an eyes emoji.
Here's a look at what some of the officials in the group chat, and some of those steadfastly standing by them, are saying now versus then.
Now: “The main thing was nothing happened. The attack was totally successful,” Trump said during a meeting with a group of his ambassadors at the White House on Tuesday.
He also called his national security adviser, Michael Waltz, “a very good man” and insisted “he will continue to do a very good job,” while adding, “I think it’s very unfair how they attacked Michael" and labeling Goldberg a “total sleazebag.”
Later, in an interview with Newsmax, Trump said a Waltz aide had Goldberg’s number and “this guy ended up on the call." He also added that he felt good about what occurred. "I can only go by what I’ve been told ... but I feel very comfortable, actually.”
Then: “Hillary is the one who sent and received classified information on an insecure server, putting the safety of the American people under threat,” Trump said in an October 2016 speech in Warren, Michigan.
“The rigged system refused to prosecute her for conduct that put all of us, everybody in this room, everybody in this country at risk. Hillary Clinton went to great lengths to create a private email server and to bypass government security in order to keep her emails from being read by the public and by federal officials,” he said in a November 2016 speech in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
And, during a Florida rally in July 2016, he even urged Russian hackers to help find a batch of emails said to have vanished from Clinton’s private server. “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing."
Now: “I think there’s a lot in the lessons for a lot of journalists in this city who have made big names for themselves making up lies about this president,” Waltz said during Tuesday’s White House meeting with Trump and the ambassadors.
He also said of Goldberg, “This journalist, Mr. President, wants the world talking about more hoaxes.”
In a subsequent interview on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle,” Waltz said, “I take full responsibility. I built the group.” He also contradicted Trump by saying that no staffer was responsible.
Waltz further acknowledged, “embarrassing, yes” and said, “We made a mistake. We’re moving forward.”
Then: “How is it Hillary Clinton can delete 33,000 government emails on a private server, yet President Trump gets indicted for having documents he could declassify?” Waltz posted in June 2023, referencing charges against Trump for mishandling classified documents. The case was scrapped after Trump won a second term.
Now: “Nobody was texting war plans,” Hegseth told journalists traveling with him in Hawaii on Monday. He said of Goldberg, “You’re talking about a deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes.”
Then: “Any security professional, military, government or otherwise, would be fired on the spot for this type of conduct and criminally prosecuted for being so reckless with this kind of information," Hegseth, then a regular contributor for Fox News Channel, said of Clinton's emails on the network in 2016.
That same year, Hegseth asked on Fox News, “How damaging is it to your ability to recruit or build allies with others when they are worried that our leaders may be exposing them because of their gross negligence or their recklessness in handling information?”
In another 2016 Fox News segment, Hegseth said, “If it was anyone other than Hillary Clinton, they would be in jail right now for what has been done. Because the assumption is, in the intelligence community, if you are using unclassified means, there is the potential for, and likelihood, that foreign governments are targeting those accounts and gathering intelligence from them."
Now: No public comment on the Signal group chat.
Then: “Nobody is above the law, not even Hillary Clinton – even though she thinks she is," Rubio told Fox News in January 2016.
The previous year in a Fox News interview, Rubio referred to the same emails when he said, “What they did is reckless — it’s complete recklessness and incompetence.”
Now: No public comment on the Signal leak.
Then: Miller posted in 2022: “One point that doesn’t get made enough about Hillary’s unsecured server illegally used to conduct state business (obviously created to hide the Clintons’ corrupt pay-for-play): foreign adversaries could easily hack classified ops & intel in real time from other side of the globe.”
Now: “My communications, to be clear, in a Signal message group were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information," Ratcliffe said at a Tuesday congressional hearing.
Then: On Fox News in 2018, Ratcliffe suggested of officials who mishandle sensitive information: “It’s always a good thing that we see that there is investigation and prosecution of folks if they’re not handling that information appropriately.”
Now: “There’s a difference between inadvertent release versus careless and sloppy, malicious leaks of classified information,” Gabbard said at the same congressional hearing.
Then: Gabbard posted on X earlier this month, “Any unauthorized release of classified information is a violation of the law and will be treated as such.”
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, joined at right by CIA Director John Ratcliffe, answer questions as the Senate Intelligence Committee holds its worldwide threats hearing, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, center, is flanked by FBI Director Kash Patel, left, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, as the Senate Intelligence Committee holds its worldwide threats hearing, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller speaks to reporters at the White House in Washington, Monday, March 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
President Donald Trump, right, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio attend a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, Monday, March 24, 2025. (Pool via AP)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth does a television interview outside the White House, Friday, March 21, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
FILE - White House National Security Adviser Mike Waltz listens to a question from a reporter in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, in Washington, Feb. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, file)
President Donald Trump attends a reception celebrating Greek Independence Day in the East Room of the White House, Monday, March 24, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
BANGKOK (AP) — The death toll from a powerful 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Myanmar jumped to more than 1,000 on Saturday as more bodies were pulled from the rubble of the scores of buildings that collapsed when it struck near the country's second-largest city.
The country's military-led government said in a statement that 1,002 people have now been found dead and another 2,376 injured, with 30 others missing. The statement suggested the numbers could still rise, saying “detailed figures are still being collected.”
Myanmar is in the throes of a prolonged and bloody civil war, which is already responsible for a massive humanitarian crisis. It makes movement around the country both difficult and dangerous, complicating relief efforts and raising fears that the death toll could still rise precipitously.
The earthquake struck midday Friday with an epicenter not far from Mandalay, followed by several aftershocks including one measuring a strong 6.4 magnitude. It sent buildings in many areas toppling to the ground, buckled roads, caused bridges to collapse and burst a dam.
In the capital Naypyidaw, crews worked Saturday to repair damaged roads, while electricity, phone and internet services remained down for most of the city. The earthquake brought down many buildings, including multiple units that housed government civil servants, but that section of the city was blocked off by authorities on Saturday.
In neighboring Thailand, the quake rocked the greater Bangkok area, home to some 17 million people, and other parts of the country.
Bangkok city authorities said so far six people have been found dead, 26 injured and 47 are still missing, most from a construction site near the capital's popular Chatuchak market.
On Saturday, more heavy equipment was brought in to move the tons of rubble, but hope was fading among friends and family members of the missing that they would be found alive.
“I was praying that that they had survived but when I got here and saw the ruin — where could they be? In which corner? Are they still alive? I am still praying that all six are alive,” said 45-year-old Naruemol Thonglek, sobbing as she awaited news about her partner, who is from Myanmar, and five friends who worked at the site.
“I cannot accept this. When I see this I can’t accept this. A close friend of mine is in there, too,” she said.
Waenphet Panta said she hadn't heard from her daughter Kanlayanee since a phone call about an hour before the quake. A friend told her Kanlayanee had been working high on the building on Friday.
“I am praying my daughter is safe, that she has survived and that she’s at the hospital,” she said, Kanlayanee’s father sitting beside her.
Thai authorities said that the quake and aftershocks were felt in most of the country's provinces. Many places in the north reported damage to residential buildings, hospitals and temples, including in Chiang Mai, but the only casualties were reported in Bangkok
Earthquakes are rare in Bangkok, but relatively common in Myanmar. The country sits on the Sagaing Fault, a major north-south fault that separates the India plate and the Sunda plate.
Brian Baptie, a seismologist with the British Geological Survey, said it appears a 200-kilometer (125-mile) section of the fault ruptured for just over a minute, with a slip of up to 5 meters (16.4 feet) in places, causing intense ground shaking in an area where most of the population lives in buildings constructed of timber and unreinforced brick masonry.
“When you have a large earthquake in an area where there are over a million people, many of them living in vulnerable buildings, the consequences can often be disastrous," he said in a statement.
“From initial reports, that seems likely to be the case here.”
Myanmar’s government said blood was in high demand in the hardest-hit areas. In a country where prior governments sometimes have been slow to accept foreign aid, Min Aung Hlaing said Myanmar was ready to accept outside assistance.
Myanmar’s military seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, and is now involved in a bloody civil war with long-established militias and newly formed pro-democracy ones.
Military forces continued their attacks even after the quake, with three airstrikes in northern Kayin state, also called Karenni state, and southern Shan — both of which border Mandalay state, said Dave Eubank, a former U.S. Special Forces soldier who founded the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian aid organization that has provided assistance to both combatants and civilians in Myanmar since the 1990s.
Eubank told The Associated Press that in the area he was operating in, most villages have already been destroyed by the military so the earthquake had little impact.
“People are in the jungle and I was out in the jungle when the earthquake hit — it was powerful, but the trees just moved, that was it for us, so we haven't had a direct impact other than that the Burma army keeps attacking, even after the quake,” he said.
Government forces have lost control of much of Myanmar, and many places are incredibly dangerous or simply impossible for aid groups to reach. More than 3 million people have been displaced by the fighting and nearly 20 million are in need, according to the United Nations.
“Although a full picture of the damage is still emerging, most of us have never seen such destruction," said Haider Yaqub, Myanmar country director for the NGO Plan International, from Yangon.
“Without a doubt, the humanitarian needs will be significant.”
China and Russia are the largest suppliers of weapons to Myanmar's military, and were among the first to step in with humanitarian aid.
A 37-member team from the Chinese province of Yunnan reached the city of Yangon early Saturday with earthquake detectors, drones and other supplies, the official Xinhua news agency reported. An additional team of 82 was sent later from Beijing, and 16 members of the Chinese civil relief squad Blue Sky Rescue Team were sent from Yunnan to northern Myanmar with medical kits, generators and other supplies, state broadcaster CGTN reported.
Russia’s emergencies ministry dispatched two planes carrying 120 rescuers and supplies, according to a report from the Russian state news agency Tass.
India sent a search and rescue team and a medical team as well as provisions, while Malaysia’s foreign ministry said the country will send 50 people on Sunday to help identify and provide aid to the worst-hit areas.
South Korea said it would provide $2 million worth of humanitarian aid through international organizations.
The United Nations allocated $5 million to start relief efforts. President Donald Trump said Friday that the U.S. was going to help with the response, but some experts were concerned about this effort given his administration’s deep cuts in foreign assistance.
AP writers Jerry Harmer and Grant Peck in Bangkok, Simina Mistreanu in Taipei and Tong-hyung Kim in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this report.
Rescuers look at debris of a high-rise building that was under construction in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, as they search for victims following its collapse after Friday' earthquake. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
Relatives wait under a shade near the damaged construction site of a high-rise building in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, as rescuers search for victims following its collapse after Friday's earthquake. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
A man peeks through an opening in a fence to watch rescue work at the site of an under-construction high-rise building that collapsed on Friday after an earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
A rescuer gives instruction at the site of an under-construction high-rise building that collapsed on Friday after an earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
In this photo taken from video released by Russian Emergency Ministry Press Service on Saturday, March 29, 2025, Russian Emergency Ministry employees gather to board one of two planes with rescuers to Myanmar following Friday's earthquake, from a Moscow airfield, Russia. (Russia Emergency Ministry press service via AP)
A collapsed building is seen after a powerful earthquake in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
A collapsed building is seen in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, Saturday, March 29, 2025, after an earthquake rocked Myanmar on Friday. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
Buddhist monks walk past a collapsed building after a powerful earthquake in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
Rescuers search for victims at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, early Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
People wait at the damaged construction site of a high-rise building in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, as rescuers search for victims following its collapse after Friday's earthquake. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
A military member directs a heavy duty machine in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, during the search for victims at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after Friday's earthquake. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)
People stand near a damaged construction site of a high-rise building in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, as rescuers search for victims following its collapse after Friday's earthquake. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)
A relative of a worker at a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake weeps as rescuers search for victims, in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)
Rescuers work at the site a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, Friday, March 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
Patients are evacuated outdoors at a hospital after a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, Friday, March 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Tadchakorn Kitchaiphon)
Rescuers search for victims at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, early Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
Rescuers search for victims at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, early Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
A rescuer walks past debris of a construction site for a high-rise building in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025, during a search mission at the collapsed building after Friday's earthquake. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)
Relatives of workers at a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake wait as rescuers search for victims, in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)
Rescuers search for victims at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a strong earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, early Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
Rescuers work at the site of a high-rise building under construction that collapsed after a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Bangkok, Thailand, early Saturday, March 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Wason Wanichakorn)
Vehicles make their way near a road damaged by an earthquake Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
A building is damaged after earthquake Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
Rescue workers take an injured man who was trapped under a building Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
Volunteers look for survivors near a damaged building Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)
In this image provided by The Myanmar Military True News Information Team, volunteers rescue near damaged buildings caused by an earthquake is seen Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (The Myanmar Military True News Information Team via AP)
In this image provided by The Myanmar Military True News Information Team, Myanmar's military leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, center, inspects damaged road caused by an earthquake Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (The Myanmar Military True News Information Team via AP)
In this image provided by The Myanmar Military True News Information Team, Damaged buildings caused by an earthquake is seen Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (The Myanmar Military True News Information Team via AP)
In this image provided by The Myanmar Military True News Information Team, Myanmar's military leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, center, inspects damaged road caused by an earthquake Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (The Myanmar Military True News Information Team via AP)
In this image provided by The Myanmar Military True News Information Team, Myanmar's military leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, center, inspects victims caused by an earthquake Friday, March 28, 2025, in Naypyitaw, Myanmar. (The Myanmar Military True News Information Team via AP)
