The Trump administration is not to delete the messages exchanged in a Signal text group—which inadvertently included a journalist—leading up to the military strikes in Yemen, a federal judge ordered Thursday. American Oversight, which advocates for government transparency, had said in a filing seeking their preservation that "these messages are imminent danger of destruction" because the app can be set to erase messages automatically, ABC News reports. US District Judge James Boasberg ordered the Trump administration to file a sworn declaration by Monday affirming that messages from March 11 to March 15 will be preserved.
A Justice Department attorney told Boasberg that the staff is working with relevant agencies "to preserve whatever records they have" while saying it's not clear what they entail, per the Hill. American Oversight's lawsuit names the top officials who were in the text group with the journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg. The judge declined a request to order administration officials to reveal whether Signal had been used in other instances, per ABC. Boasberg has been attacked by President Trump over his ruling on deportations, and he opened the hearing Thursday with a detailed explanation of how cases are randomly assigned to judges. After investigations into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol began, government agencies including the Secret Service, Homeland Security, and the Defense Department reported no longer having text messages sent on that day. (More Signal breach stories.)
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