The Pentagon released a memo on Friday which informed national security reporters that they must sign a pledge to publish only information “approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released, even if it is unclassified.”
If the journalists don’t comply, they will lose their Pentagon press credentials, which provide access to the Pentagon and other U.S. military facilities.
President Trump’s Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defended the new constraints on journalists and said, “the ‘press’ does not run the Pentagon — the people do.”
U.S. Senator Jack Reed (D-RI), a veteran and the senior Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he thought the new effort was intended to make journalists “mere stenographers for the party in power or the Pentagon itself.”
U.S. Representative Don Bacon (R-NE), also a veteran, responded to the Pentagon’s new constraint on journalists: “This is so dumb that I have a hard time believing it is true. We don’t want a bunch of Pravda newspapers only touting the Government’s official position. A free press makes our country better. This sounds like more amateur hour.”
This is so dumb that I have a hard time believing it is true. We don’t want a bunch of Pravda newspapers only touting the Government’s official position. A free press makes our country better. This sounds like more amateur hour. https://t.co/XXhQJiCGK0
— Rep. Don Bacon 🇺🇸✈️🏍️⭐️🎖️ (@RepDonBacon) September 20, 2025
U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) responded to Bacon: “‘Too dumb to believe it’s true’ — welcome to Trumpland.”
The National Press Club responded to the Pentagon’s new pledge requirement in a written statement (below), which noted: “If the news about our military must first be approved by the government, then the public is no longer getting independent reporting. It is getting only what officials want them to see. That should alarm every American.”
.@PressClubDC statement on Pentagon restrictions that threaten independent journalism. https://t.co/aDll6OTPR0 pic.twitter.com/QJsgeZ9sLU
— Mike Balsamo (@MikeBalsamo1) September 20, 2025
Note: After it was revealed in April that Secretary Hegseth had shared information in a Signal group chat related to U.S. military airstrikes in Yemen (and unbeknownst to him with The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, who was accidentally added to the chat by then-National Security Advisor Mike Waltz), Sen. Reed and the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MI), requested an Inspector General (IG) review to determine whether Hegseth violated any laws related to the handling of classified information.
Hegseth called the IG review “a political witch hunt by Biden administration holdovers” and “a sham, conducted in bad faith and with extreme bias.”
CNN reported on September 15 that the Pentagon’s internal watchdog completed a monthslong review of Hegseth’s use of the Signal app and submitted its findings to Hegseth for review.
