American Oversight Files Response to Trump Admin’s Failure to Comply with Court Order to Preserve Signalgate Messages

On Wednesday, nonpartisan watchdog American Oversight filed a response in its Signalgate lawsuit highlighting the Trump administration’s failure to comply with the court’s order to promptly make best efforts to preserve all Signal communications from March 11-15, 2025, following the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) revelation that it failed to recover any messages from Director John Ratcliffe’s personal Signal account. Furthermore, the evidence strongly suggests someone took affirmative steps to delete Signal messages — potentially even after the court’s order.

The evidence uncovered through American Oversight’s lawsuit shows that the administration’s efforts were neither prompt, nor their best, and worse, that administration officials may have stood by while evidence subject to the temporary restraining order (TRO) was modified or deleted.

For instance, despite March 15 messages in the Signal chat having been set to a four-week expiration window, no substantive messages were recovered. The only content retrieved from CIA Director Ratcliffe’s personal Signal account on March 31 consisted of the name of the chat, “Houthi PC small group,” and notifications relating to changes in administrative settings in this group chat, such as profile names and message settings. Such settings changes, however, would not have affected the availability of previously sent messages, strongly suggesting someone took affirmative steps to manually delete them, potentially even after the court order was issued.

“The evidence submitted by the government strongly suggests someone took affirmative steps to delete Signal messages, potentially even after the court’s order, in violation of federal law. The administration’s brazen indifference to our national security and the safety of our men and women in uniform in this matter is now compounded by its blatant disregard for a co-equal branch of the government. With this filing today, we are ensuring the court and the American public are fully aware of the Trump administration’s actions to date,” said Chioma Chukwu, interim Executive Director of American Oversight. “Any obstruction, delay, or defiance of lawful court orders undermines our system of checks and balances, and we will continue using every tool at our disposal to push back against it.”

Since President Trump took office, American Oversight has filed numerous lawsuits and has launched investigations into the administration’s use of Signal to conduct official government business, the Trump administration’s plan to gut Social Security, Trump’s mass firing of independent inspectors general, DOGE’s secretive efforts to invade agencies, the Trump administration’s quid pro quo deal with New York City Mayor Eric Adams, and its directive to USAID staff to shred and burn government records. American Oversight will continue to hold Trump and his allies accountable by shining a light on the administration’s actions.