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The Presidential Records Act and the Federal Records Act require officials to preserve communications related to government business.
Luke Broadwater is a White House correspondent. He reported from New York.
- March 27, 2025, 5:48 p.m. ET
The Signal group chat that senior Trump administration officials convened to discuss military strikes in Yemen has sparked outrage over the reckless way a journalist was mistakenly added to the group.
But open government experts have raised another concern as well: the rise in usage of disappearing messaging apps like Signal, which they say could become a way for officials to skirt the requirements of federal laws meant to preserve government records.
“It’s a huge problem,” said Anne Weismann, a George Washington Law professor who frequently acts as outside counsel for nonprofits who push for more openness in government. “If the secretary of defense is participating in a conversation about planning an attack, I think it’s hard to argue there’s any circumstance in which that would not be appropriate for preservation.”
Two federal laws — the Presidential Records Act and the Federal Records Act — require officials to preserve communications related to government business. Agencies can comply with the law by instructing those using messaging apps to preserve chats through screen shots or other means.
Presidential records, which would include the communications of Vice President JD Vance, who participated in the Signal chat, must be permanently preserved. Many other federal records are considered temporary, but they must be preserved until the National Archives and Records Administration approves their destruction.
All of this affects what records the public can eventually see through Freedom of Information Act requests. If there is no record preserved, there is nothing to release.
