Signal app war plan leak broke the law, Texas expert says

HOUSTON - A Texas expert on government transparency requirements believes the leak of "war plans" by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and others may well have violated laws governing retention of government records.

What they're saying:

Former Travis County Judge Bill Aleshire helped write Texas's Freedom of Information law.

That statute mirrors in many ways Federal Open Records Law, which demands "record retention" even if the content of the communication between government officials is "highly confidential. 

Aleshire says that by using the Signal App, Hegseth and everyone involved in the communication made an end-run around mandated transparency.

"Even in the federal government, it is important for there to be a record made, even if that record must be and is appropriately held confidential. At least, the record is there for those who have access to know what happened," said Aleshire.

Dig deeper:

Encryption experts at the University of Houston tell FOX 26, the Signal App is nearly impossible to hack, which means government officials, at all levels, have the capacity to communicate in an unrecorded "black box", but are essentially breaking the law each time they do so.

"We kind of have the worst of both worlds here - the lack of transparency by the use of that app, while on the other hand, spilling the beans to the news media in advance of an attack, exactly what was going to happen, when it was going to happen and who it was going to happen to," said Aleshire.