Democratic senators demanded answers from leaders of the US intelligence community on Tuesday on how the top editor of the Atlantic was added to a group chat discussing airstrikes in Yemen, arguing that the “sloppy, careless” leak put national security at risk.

The unusual story broke on Monday, when the Atlantic published a piece by its editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, who said he had been added to the group on the messaging app Signal, and watched as accounts that appeared to match top Trump administration officials, including Vice-President JD Vance and the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, debated and then coordinated a wave of bombings targeting the Houthis in Yemen.

Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, and John Ratcliffe, the CIA director, both of whom were also in the group, appeared on Tuesday before the Senate intelligence committee for an annual hearing on threats facing the United States, which Democrats used to accuse them of failing to protect sensitive details of US military operations.