The Setmayer Sound Off | Signalgate & MAGA Security FAILURES!
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hey, Lemon Nation. I'm Tara Setmayer, and welcome to this week's Setmayer Sound Off. Okay, so you know there was no way I wasn't going to talk about this absolute insanity and absurdity of the latest Trump administration scandal. Signalgate. Or maybe I should call it the next episode of, I don't know, America's Dumbest Security Fails Season 1. First of all, we had this signal chat disaster, we've all read about it by now, where Trump's top officials accidentally added the Atlantic's editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, into a group chat discussing really sensitive military operations in Yemen. You would think that after something like that, that's that asinine, that they'd be on high alert. But... Maybe like put together a little refresher course on OPSEC for dummies or how not to leak national security information 101.
I don't know. But you know what? That would require way too much competence. So have you heard the latest headlines? Okay, this is the news now. Venmo has entered the chat. Yes, the same app that you use to pay back your friends for like Taco Tuesday or it's like to pay your teenage babysitter on the weekends. Yeah, that app. Again, big shout out to Wired.com for the win. According to their latest report, it turns out that the National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, he left his Venmo friends list public. All 328 of them. And who's on this illustrious list? Well, according to Wired, it's everyone from White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles to the National Security Staffer Walker Barrett. And then there's a who's who of like Trump world cronies.
Quote, other accounts carry the names of a wide range of media figures from on-air personalities like Brett Baer and Brian Kilmeade of Fox News, shocker, and Brianna Keillor and Kristen Holmes of CNN to a cable news producer, a prominent national security reporter, local news anchors, documentarians, and noted conspiracy theorist Ivan Raiklin, who calls himself, quote, the Secretary of Retribution. and he once created a deep state target list. These are Mike Walsh's friends. Now, I'm no CIA operative, but even I know that broadcasting your entire inner circle on a public platform is basically an invitation to foreign intelligence agencies like, hey, Russian Chinese spies, here's my network of contacts.
Feel free to exploit at your leisure. But here's the kicker, okay? This Venmo fiasco, it stayed public until Wednesday afternoon. That's after the Signal Chat scandal already made headlines.
What happened in the Signalgate group chat leak and why does it matter?
So it's kind of like realizing your house is on fire and then deciding, hey, might as well toss some more gasoline on it while we're here. This isn't embarrassing. It's just, it's dangerous. When top officials handle national security like reckless teenagers on TikTok, we should all be terrified. And by the way, if you have Venmo, you may want to check your privacy settings. Just saying. I did. But it doesn't end there, people. Another story just reported out of the German publication Der Spiegel, and it was picked up here in the U.S. They claim that passwords and private information belonging to top national security officials in the Trump administration have been found online. Okay, in the stunning report published Wednesday, the paper says, quote, it's journalists used commercial people searches, search engines, along with hacked customer data that has been published on the web.
So those whose information was compromised, people included in this? Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. So first, the Signal scandal, where 18 top Trump officials were using an unsecured app to coordinate military operations on an app that the Pentagon literally warned against using. They warned against using Signal because our adversaries like Russia, I don't know, China, Iran, they can easily exploit this. And now the password thing. These are the brilliant minds. They just went ahead planning military operations on an app best suited for gossiping about brunch.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–3:02
2
What happened in the Signalgate group chat leak and why does it matter?
3:02–6:17
3
How did the accidental inclusion of a journalist escalate national security concerns?
6:17–7:24
4
Which Venmo privacy lapse exposed National Security Advisor Mike Waltz’s contacts?
7:24–15:11
5
What sensitive personal data of top officials was found online and who was affected?
15:11–15:38
Speakers
4 identifiedMore from The Don Lemon Show
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