National Guardsman Jack Teixeira arrested in US intel leaks

Massachusetts Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira was arrested at his home Thursday after being implicated in the leak of dozens of sensitive US intelligence documents — the biggest national security breach in at least 10 years.

Law enforcement officers swarmed the home in North Dighton, Mass. about 20 miles east of Providence, RI hours after the New York Times reported that investigators wanted to speak with Teixeira, who was reportedly stationed at Fort Bragg in North Carolina.

The classified pages were disseminated after being posted on a Discord channel linked to YouTuber “wow_mao” and quickly spread when a member of that channel posted some of them to a bigger channel called “Minecraft Earth Map.”

Sensitive information relating to the war in Ukraine, Israel and South Korea was leaked, sparking international concern.

White House spokesman John Kirby said Monday that the documents, which seem to indicate the US is surveilling its close allies, are “doctored.”

“Without confirming the validity of the documents, this is information that has no business in the public domain. It has no business, if you don’t mind me saying, on the pages of — the front pages of newspapers or on television,” he said.” It is not intended for public consumption, and it should not be out there.”

The files had initially been shared last year on a discord channel Teixeira appeared to run called “Thug Shaker Central,” made up of two dozen people who regularly discussed guns, video games and racist memes.

The Washington Post reported that Teixeira was known to channel members by the handle “jackthedripper.”

One member of the original channel told the New York Times the leaker “was a Christian, anti-war, just wanted to inform some of his friends about what’s going on,” and had access to the documents through work. “We have some people in our group who are in Ukraine. We like fighting games, we like war games.”