James O'Brien is 'enraged' by the White House leaked texts scandal | LBC

Donald Trump's closest aides called European countries "pathetic" and slammed them as "freeloaders" in bombshell leaked texts revealed when a journalist was accidentally added to a group chat.

James O’Brien brands this ‘the most egregious national security breach you can think of’.

The US president’s national security team, including vice-president JD Vance, defense secretary Peter Hegseth, Marco Rubio and the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard used the group chat to discuss top secret plans for airstrikes on Yemen.

National Security Adviser Mike Waltz started the chat on Signal, a commercial encrypted messaging app, accidentally adding a journalist who saw their secret plans.

Regardless of its encryption, the app is not an approved form of communicating sensitive information by the US government.

Vance addressed a message to Hegseth, saying: ‘if you think we should do it let’s go. I just hate bailing Europe out again."

“The user identified as Hegseth responded three minutes later: “VP: I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC. But Mike is correct, we are the only ones on the planet (on our side of the ledger) who can do this.

“Nobody else even close. Question is timing. I feel like now is as good a time as any, given POTUS directive to reopen shipping lanes. I think we should go; but POTUS still retains 24 hours of decision space.”

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