In an article published by The Atlantic magazine, President Donald Trump expressed confidence in Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth's performance.

Yet that confidence is not shared by former National Security John Bolton, who recently argued that Hegseth needs to "resign for his own safety's sake."

CNN host points to Hegseth's controversial use of the messaging app Signal

According to Breitbart, Bolton made that claim during an interview earlier this week with Pamela Brown, who co-hosts CNN's "The Source."

John Bolton says that Defense Sec Pete Hegseth should "resign for his own safety's sake."

Is that a threat? @FBIpic.twitter.com/xje2rvUvD6

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) April 29, 2025

When the conversation turned to Hegseth, Brown pointed to "at least two instances of him using the commercial app Signal to discuss sensitive military info."

"Trump tells The Atlantic that he believes Hegseth will get it together," Brown noted before asking, "Do you believe Hegseth should still be on the job?"

Bolton: America doesn't need "somebody who spends his time on Signal chat groups"

"No. I think he should resign for for his own safety’s sake if nothing else," Bolton said in response, adding, "This is a critical time for the American military,"

"We understand the Trump administration will rightly propose enormous budget increases for defense. We need it," the former White House official continued.

Bolton further asserted that the country is in need of "a secretary who can get the job done, not somebody who spends his time on Signal chat groups."

What's more, Bolton boasted that he "almost never" made use of his personal phone during his tenure as national security adviser.

Trump said the U.S. would be "in World War Six" if he had listened to Bolton

Bolton has been a vociferous critic of the president and his administration ever since Trump fired him as national security adviser back in 2019.

He subsequently put out a book the following year titled "The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,"
which alleged that Trump frequently allowed political considerations to determine his policy moves.

"I am hard-pressed to identify any significant Trump decision during my tenure that wasn’t driven by reelection calculations," Bolton wrote.

As Fox News reported at the time, Trump reacted to his former national security adviser's accusations with a social media post in which he asserted that "if I listened to him, we would be in World War Six by now."