Hegseth's Safe Space

On Friday afternoon, just before the holiday weekend was set to begin, word began to spread among Pentagon reporters: new, even more restrictive press limitations were imminent. Shortly after, the Pentagon Press Association was informed just how sweeping they would be. Pete Hegseth, the embattled Secretary of Defense, announced he would revoke journalists’ long-held ability to navigate the Pentagon’s unclassified hallways freely, cutting off access that has been permitted across Republican and Democratic administrations for decades.

Hegseth cloaked the decision in the language of national security. In a memo that he publicized via tweet, Hegseth claimed the restrictions were necessary to safeguard “sensitive information—the unauthorized disclosure of which could put the lives of U.S. Service members in danger.” But to many reporters, the rationale felt hollow—especially coming from a figure at the center of Signalgate, the scandal involving Hegseth’s own use of an insecure messaging app to conduct sensitive military business. The notion that hallway access for credentialed reporters posed more of a security threat than his own sloppy use of an encrypted messaging app struck many as absurd, to say the least.

The Pentagon Press Association wasted no time issuing a sharp rebuttal. “Journalists have had access to unclassified spaces in the Pentagon for decades,” the group wrote, “including in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, without any concern about OpSec from DoD leadership.” The statement didn’t mince words, further noting that under Hegseth’s new rules, “journalists working from the Pentagon every day will now have less freedom of movement than officers from foreign countries assigned to the U.S. military’s headquarters, as well as maintenance staff and concessions workers scattered throughout one of the world’s largest office buildings.” Even more importantly, the group noted, the decision “eliminates the media’s freedom to freely access press officers for the military services who are specifically hired to respond to press queries.”

The public backlash was significant. But while that back-and-forth played out in public, it wasn’t the only move the Pentagon made in recent days to tighten its grip on the press. Behind the scenes, another troubling incident, which has not been reported until now, unfolded—one that left the press corps alarmed.