The New York Times filed a new lawsuit against the Department of Defense and Secretary Pete Hegseth, this time challenging a policy that requires credentialed journalists to have an official escort when inside the Pentagon.
In the lawsuit, the Times’ attorneys wrote that the purpose of the policy “is to restrict journalists’ ability to do what they have always done: ask questions of government employees and gather information to report stories that take the public beyond official pronouncements.”
In March, shortly after a federal judge ruled that a previous set of Hegseth’s press restrictions were unconstitutional, the Pentagon implemented a new set of interim guidelines, including the one requiring press escorts. The judge, Paul Friedman, also struck down a number of those new restrictions, but they remain in place as the Pentagon pursues an appeal.
The Times’ attorneys wrote that the Pentagon’s restrictions were retaliatory, designed to punish news outlets for publishing stories that they disfavor.
“To report effectively on the Department, a reporter often must speak with over a dozen officials sitting in Public Affairs offices spread throughout the building,” the lawsuit stated. “For decades, the Pentagon’s press-access policies reflected this physical reality by allowing reporters unescorted access in unsecured corridors so that they can move from press office to press office and ask questions on short notice as events unfolded. The Interim Policy breaks sharply from that history and tradition.”
The Times lawsuit stated that for reporters to now ask “even one question,” they “must call or email for an appointment, wait for a response, get an escort, ask their question, and return to the library outside the Pentagon—only to repeat the process for the next source. Reporters must either forgo conversations or else spend hours chasing schedulers by phone and shuttling in and out of the building.”
A Pentagon spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
