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The administration says the native of El Salvador entered this country illegally in 2011 and was arrested in 2019 and held after he was identified “as a ranking member of the deadly MS-13 gang.”

On 26 March, Senate Armed Services Committee chair Republican Roger Wicker and ranking member Democrat Jack Reed asked the Pentagon watchdog to probe what messages were communicated in the Signal chat, defence department policy on sharing sensitive information on non-government networks and recommendations on actions the government should take.

The top Democrats on the House and Senate intelligence committees - Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, and Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence - disclosed Gen Haugh's firing to CBS.

Warren is the ranking Democratic member of the Senate Banking Committee and Wyden is the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee.

This was meant to call attention to the shamefulness of this hearing, "if shame was still a thing," as the committee's ranking member Stephen Lynch, D-Mass. put it.