Pentagon To Reporters: Publish Approved Information Or Lose Access

From Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth's Flickr and in the public domain.

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The Pentagon will revoke access to reporters who publish any information that Secretary Pete Hegseth and other United States military officials have not approved for release.

Sean Parnell, an official in the public affairs division of the Pentagon, issued a September 18, 2025, memo [PDF] outlining new restrictions. Reporters are now required to acknowledge that they will lose their media badge if it is determined that they disclosed “classified national security information” or “controlled unclassified information” without authorization.

“This policy operates as a prior restraint on publication which is considered the most serious of First Amendment violations,” Seth Stern, the advocacy director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, told the New York Times. “The government cannot prohibit journalists from public information merely by claiming it’s a secret or even a national security threat.”

Stern emphasized that the “government is legally prohibited from requiring journalists to surrender their right to investigate the government in exchange for access or credentials.”