The Pentagon’s New Press Policy Is Absurd

No one is happy about the Pentagon’s new press policy. Earlier this week, media outlets spanning the political spectrum almost universally declined to sign on to a memorandum issued by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth: It would require defense reporters to promise that they will not seek to obtain unauthorized information.

“Information must be approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released, even if it is unclassified,” the memorandum states.

Hegseth is, of course, within his rights to forbid his own employees from leaking stories to journalists, to the extent that’s possible. Federal officials who leak classified documents can be prosecuted under existing law (although it is often in the public’s interest for them to do so anyway). But if anything is to be done, government policy should place constraints on government employees—not on journalists, or the public. Obviously reporters are going to try to induce Pentagon officials to provide information, even if it’s not “approved for public release” by Hegseth’s personal PR department.

This is so obvious that it’s effectively nonpartisan, which is why conservative news outlets Fox News, Newsmax, The Daily Caller, Real Clear Politics, and The Washington Examiner have joined liberal and mainstream organizations in rejecting the agreement. In fact, the only outlet that has agreed to the Pentagon’s terms is One America News Network (OANN), which is effectively tied to the administration: Kari Lake, overseer of the government-funded broadcaster Voice of America, announced earlier this year that the platform would use content from OANN. (As an aside, this is a very good argument against government-funded media, be it right-leaning or left-leaning.)

The major broadcast channels issued a joint statement that read in part: “The policy is without precedent and threatens core journalistic protections. We will continue to cover the U.S. military as each of our organizations has done for many decades, upholding the principles of a free and independent press.”

In response, the department is attempting to split hairs.

“The policy does not ask for them to agree, just to acknowledge that they understand what our policy is,” said Sean Parnell, a spokesperson for the Pentagon, in a statement. “This has caused reporters to have a full blown meltdown, crying victim online. We stand by our policy because it’s what’s best for our troops and the national security of this country.”

But whether it’s agreeing to the policy or acknowledging the policy, this comes to the same thing: The Pentagon doesn’t want reporters asking questions and obtaining answers without Hegseth’s approval. That’s self-evidently absurd, and is not in the interests of liberals, or conservatives, or more importantly, the American public.

Why liberals should reject such a policy is fairly obvious: Trump-critical journalists should feel free to hold the administration to account. But even MAGA-friendly reporters don’t want to feel deterred from doing their jobs. For instance, imagine if a conservative outlet obtained a tip that some Defense sub-department was still using DEI in hiring, or had issued a policy directive that is contrary to America First, or had simply misappropriated taxpayer funds. (This last example is hardly theoretical: the Pentagon has failed seven audits in a row!) It might be embarrassing for Hegseth that this had happened under his watch, and he might wish to suppress a news report on it; his incentive would be to decline to authorize the release of information about the situation, or to release it in a way that is flattering to the administration’s perspective.

But conservative news organizations shouldn’t play by those rules: They would be doing their readers, viewers, and subscribers a disservice if they did.

It’s to the Trump administration’s credit that they have made space for new media, podcasters, and social media influencers in the press pool. President Trump and his comms team understand that more and more Americans are getting news and information from a more diverse array of content providers who make use of all the new platforms available to them: YouTube, X, Spotify, Instagram, Substack, Rumble, and so on. The old world is dead, etc. etc.

But that doesn’t mean that all the habits of legacy media should be discarded along with it. Too often, the new media folks resort to cheerleading for the administration and fail to ask tough questions. We don’t want that. Old media should learn from new media—in terms of how to communicate with new audiences—and new media should learn from old media concerning the fundamentals of reporting. We don’t want that to disappear entirely.

There was a big story in Politico early this week that has earned considerable attention on social media: “‘I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat.” The reporter obtained chat logs in which the leaders of various young Republican groups expressed racist, anti-Semitic, homophobic, and pro-nazi sentiments—sometimes straddling the line between irony and offensive humor, and other times descending into overt nastiness and prejudice. This has been a big topic of conversation, and since I’m known for defending young people who get canceled over offensive speech, several people have asked for my opinion. Here are my thoughts, in no particular order:

• The participants in this chat aren’t that young. They’re in their 20s and 30s. I think in the modern era, in which social media and texting—default modes of communication for young people—provide a live transcript of everything that everyone has ever said since birth, it makes sense to practice broad forgiveness up until the age of adulthood. These texts shouldn’t ruin lives if penned by 16-year-olds. But two of the most prominently shamed individuals are aged 24 and 31. That makes it much worse.
• Many prominent voices on the right, including Vice President J.D. Vance and commentator Matt Walsh, are downplaying the significance of the story. Vance said people who are fixated on attacking these “kids” needed to “grow up,” and Walsh suggested that conservatives turning on each other was a bigger problem. What I would say in response to them is that even if you don’t have a particular moral objection to the offensive language your youth activists are using, it nevertheless would be smart politically to encourage them not to praise Hitler! That’s because most normal people find this weird and off-putting. People don’t want to give money to Hitler apologists, they don’t want to hire Hitler apologists, and they don’t want to vote for Hitler apologists.
• That said, everybody clutching their pearls extremely aggressively here would probably be surprised if a running transcript of their lives were made public. We all use edgier language in private settings, around friends, and when we feel safe to do so. This is particularly true for young guys. The availability of technology that makes it easier for guys to segregate themselves into single-sex communications spaces is definitely having a kind of radicalizing effect on how far the average Gen-Z or millennial male is willing to push the envelope in terms of crude humor. This chat may have been on the extreme end of that, but I think it is by no means unusual, unfortunately.
• Nevertheless, there are very solid, practical reasons to develop habits of restraint, especially if you are a political activist working in the domain of communications. Edgy, offensive, ironic humor about “gas chambers” is not going to help elect Republicans. Moreover—and I have to think this is at least part of the story—it’s not going to help these guys in social situations, particularly social situations involving women. They do want wives and families, right? This is often listed as a top concern of young MAGA dudes: finding a woman who shares their values and wants to start a family—a task made more difficult due to increasing gender-based polarization. Many, many women who are otherwise politically conservative will be turned off by the kinds of views expressed in the Young Republicans group chat; Heil Hitler is not a great pickup line.
• It is inarguably the case that Nick Fuentes—an “America First” podcaster who expresses views that are abjectly anti-Semitic and racist—is enjoying a huge surge in popularity. Conservative personalities who do not want to turn over their movement to a man who doesn’t just joke about being pro-Hitler, but is actually pro-Hitler, need to come up with a better strategy than either ignoring him (does not work) or deplatforming him (also does not work).

I am joined by Amber Duke—and later this week, Andrew Heaton—to discuss the top news stories: John Oliver slamming Bari Weiss, Marjorie Taylor Greene’s turn, and more.

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I have returned to a familiar well: Agatha Christie! I have just begun reading The Secret of Chimneys, and am thoroughly enjoying it. It really feels like a Poirot novel, and so I have to keep reminding myself that the beloved Belgian detective doesn’t turn up in this one, sadly.