'New phone, Houthi dis?' Trump official mocked for saying he never met Atlantic reporter

U.S. National Security Advisor Mike Waltz was ridiculed Tuesday afternoon as he tried to blame the reporter Waltz reportedly invited into a Signal group chat with top Cabinet officials in President Donald Trump's administration to discuss war plans.

Waltz told reporters he'd never met Jeffrey Goldberg, who penned a bombshell piece in The Atlantic revealing that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth shared possibly classified war plans in the chat that included a reporter among its membership. The plans were about imminent strikes on the Houthis in Yemen.

"There's a lot of journalists in this city who have made big names for themselves, making up lies about this president," said Waltz.

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He went on to say, "And this one in particular, I've never met, don't know, never communicated with. And we are, uh, and we are looking into and reviewing how the heck he got into this [chat] room."

The denial led to scores of memes and gifs across Bluesky and X at Waltz's expense, as well as movie and TV clips poking fun that, "We don't know each other."

A former CIA attorney who goes by "Secrets and Lies" remarked, "Each of these officials has an unclassified .gov email address that they can access from an encrypted, government-issued mobile device. If communications are unclassified & stay focused on logistics, this system is perfectly fine. They aren't using Signal for security reasons."

Lawfare's Quinta Jurecic posted Waltz's video claiming he's "never met" Goldberg with the comment, "Me when I miss my deadline."

Just Security co-editor-in-chief Ryan Goodman posted a response to Trump's denial that there was classified information in the chat.

"I have a hard time believing there was no classified info in the Signal chat, given The Atlantic report of Hegseth's communications in the group about targeting and attack plans. And ... Pro Tip: The federal crimes that are most relevant to this do not depend on the information being classified," said Goodman.

CBS reporter Jim LaPorta unearthed a June 2023 tweet from Waltz saying, "Biden's sitting National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan sent Top Secret Messages to Hillary Clinton's private account. And what did DOJ do about it? Not a damn thing."

Political thriller writer David Pepper picked up on Waltz's denial that he ever communicated with Goldberg: "Actually, you did communicate with him." He included a clown emoji.

Another individual posted a meme of Waltz with the comment, "New phone, Houthi dis?"