US National Security Adviser Mike Walz, who was called to resign over his role in the Signal chat group scandal over Yemen, has come under fresh criticism after the Washington Post reported that he used Gmail for official work purposes.
One of Waltz's closest aides has also used Gmail to discuss military positions and weapons systems, again raising questions about the handling of sensitive data in President Donald Trump's administration.
Walz had a schedule and other work documents that were sent to his Google email account, the Washington Post reported.
The White House confirmed that Waltz had "received emails and calendar invitations from legacy contacts on his personal email," but that he had been "sending copies to government accounts" since the beginning of the Trump administration to satisfy record retention laws.
Waltz "has never sent classified material through his personal email account or through any unsecured platform," said National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes, who called the disclosure "yet another attempt to distract the American people from President Trump's successful national security agenda."
Last month, Waltz sparked an embarrassing saga for the Trump administration after he inadvertently added the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine to a group chat on Signal, a commercial messaging app, in which airstrikes against Yemen's Houthi rebels were discussed.
Officials, including Waltz and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, used the chat to talk about details of the timing of the airstrikes and intelligence, unaware that the highly sensitive information was being read simultaneously by a journalist. | BGNES, AFP
