More than 30 major news organizations, including The Associated Press, The New York Times and CNN, vacated their Pentagon workspaces this week after refusing to sign a new media access policy from the Defense Department. The policy, revised October 6, 2025, requires journalists to acknowledge that seeking unauthorized information could strip them of credentials and expose them to prosecution, prompting widespread condemnation as a direct assault on press freedoms.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, appointed in January 2025, introduced the rules amid escalating restrictions on media access that began in May 2025. Those earlier measures limited unescorted entry to large sections of the Pentagon, including public affairs offices for military services. The updated policy escalates this by demanding reporters affirm in writing that soliciting non-public information — even if unclassified — constitutes a security risk not shielded by the First Amendment. Non-signers face immediate loss of badges and escorted-only visits, effectively barring independent reporting from the building that houses 23,000 employees and shapes U.S. national security strategy.
The exodus unfolded October 15, 2025, as reporters from outlets across the political spectrum turned in government-issued passes and cleared out desks in the Pentagon’s National Military Command Center press area. Hegseth defended the changes during a Fox News appearance October 5, 2025, stating, “The Pentagon press corps can squeal all they want, we’re taking these things seriously. They can report, they just need to make sure they’re following rules.” Yet critics, including former CIA Director Leon Panetta, labeled it a “clear violation of the Constitution” in a CNN interview October 14, 2025, arguing it spoon-feeds information rather than allowing scrutiny of government actions.
The Pentagon Press Association, representing credentialed reporters, advised members against signing through its counsel, David Schulz, director of Yale University’s Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic. Schulz described the policy as criminalizing routine journalism: “What they call solicitation, we call newsgathering. That’s something that’s protected by the Constitution, and reporters have to be able to gather information, ask questions, seek out the news, if we’re to have a free press, which is exactly what the First Amendment guarantees to us.” He added that affirming harm from unapproved disclosures — even of unclassified material — could be weaponized in future Espionage Act cases, chilling coverage of issues like troop deployments or budget overruns.
A joint statement from NBC News, ABC News, CBS News, CNN and Fox News underscored the unified front: “We join virtually every other news organization in declining to agree to the Pentagon’s new requirements, which would restrict journalists’ ability to keep the nation and the world informed of important national security issues.” The Associated Press instructed its staff to exit, with reporter Nancy Youssef of The Atlantic — who covers national security — explaining, “To agree to not solicit information is to agree to not be a journalist. Our whole goal is soliciting information.”
Defense trade publications, vital for specialized coverage of military procurement and strategy, issued a collective refusal October 15, 2025. Their statement read: “The Pentagon has been seeking to impose unprecedented restrictions on journalists’ ability to cover the military for several months. Having restricted where unescorted media may go in the Pentagon… department leaders are asking reporters to sign a document acknowledging a vague new policy that, on its face, appears to contravene the First Amendment. This policy threatens to punish reporters who ask legitimate questions in the course of their daily work and to impose material harm on our news organizations for factual reporting.” Signatories included Aviation Week, Breaking Defense, Defense News, Military Times and USNI News.
PBS NewsHour, among the first to reject the policy publicly, highlighted its broader threat in an October 14, 2025, segment. Schulz reiterated there: “The obvious intent here is to intimidate and chill reporting on anything that’s not officially disclosed.” Youssef noted the practical fallout: Reporters would lose chances to embed with sailors on ships or troops in Humvees, diminishing nuanced public understanding of deployments that risk American lives.
Outlets refusing the policy span ideologies and formats: The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Politico, The Guardian, The Atlantic, Reuters, Al Jazeera, BBC and Democracy Now!, alongside broadcast giants like those in the joint statement. Even conservative voices such as Newsmax and the Daily Caller opted out. Only One America News Network, a far-right outlet, agreed to sign, drawing scrutiny for its alignment with administration priorities.
This policy contravenes the First Amendment by imposing a de facto prior restraint on speech, a practice U.S. courts have long deemed the “most serious and least tolerable” infringement on press rights. Chief Justice Warren Burger wrote in the 1976 Nebraska Press Association v. Stuart decision: “The damage can be particularly great when the prior restraint falls upon the communication of news and commentary on current events.” The Pentagon’s language explicitly deems solicitation of unauthorized information unprotected, despite Supreme Court precedents protecting newsgathering as core to free expression.
First Amendment attorney Kevin Goldberg of the Freedom Forum explained: “We’re not talking about information that violates the law here, and reporters have the right to ask questions and request information… about unclassified information.” The policy’s vagueness — labeling seekers as “security risks” on a case-by-case basis — invites arbitrary enforcement, echoing rejected attempts at censorship like the 1931 Near v. Minnesota ruling, where Chief Justice Charles Hughes affirmed that restraints on exposing public malfeasance violate constitutional guarantees.
Law professor Jonathan Turley, speaking on Fox News, warned: “What they’re basically saying is if you publish anything that’s not in the press release… you could be held responsible under this policy. That is going to create a stranglehold on the free press, and the cost is too great.” Clay Calvert, a First Amendment scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, added that controlling access “is the chokepoint for journalism. If you can control access to information, you can control journalism.”
Such controls undermine national security, as imprisoned journalist Peter Greste argued: “Attacks on journalism… are a national security issue, and we have to protect press freedom… anything that undermines press freedom undermines national security.” Landmark exposés, from the Pentagon Papers to Watergate, relied on persistent questioning of officials — exactly what this policy targets.
While the policy targets Pentagon credentialing and does not directly impact The Southern Maryland Chronicle, a community-focused outlet serving Calvert, Charles and St. Mary’s counties, its ripples extend to local journalism. Southern Maryland hosts key military installations, including Naval Air Station Patuxent River, where 18,000 personnel support aircraft testing and defense contracting that bolsters the region’s 160,000 residents. Chronicle reporters routinely draw on national security reporting from partners like the AP and Defense News for stories on base expansions, veteran services, and economic impacts from federal contracts worth billions annually.
By eroding trust in federal transparency, the policy sets a precedent that could embolden similar restrictions at other agencies, complicating access to unclassified data on installations affecting local waterways, schools, and housing. Small outlets like the Chronicle, with limited resources for on-site Pentagon scrutiny, depend on aggregated wire service insights to inform readers about how defense policies influence crab harvests in the Chesapeake Bay or traffic on Route 4 near Andrews Air Force Base. A chilled national press means diluted local coverage, potentially delaying alerts on environmental reviews for Pax River flight paths or hiring booms at Lockheed Martin facilities in Lexington Park.
The Chronicle stands firmly behind its media partners in this standoff, recognizing that press freedom is indivisible. As Schulz noted, “The courts are still open to hold officials to account when they exceed their constitutional authority.” Legal challenges loom, with outlets eyeing lawsuits under the First Amendment. Retired Gen. Jack Keane, a Fox News analyst, captured the stakes: “What they’re really doing, they want to spoon-feed information to the journalist, and that would be their story. That’s not journalism.”
Historically, Pentagon-media relations have balanced security with openness since World War II, when embedded reporters chronicled D-Day without such oaths. The 1960s escalation in Vietnam saw investigative pieces expose body counts and strategic flaws, informing congressional oversight. Today’s policy reverses that ethos, prioritizing control over accountability at a time when U.S. forces operate in 80 countries and face scrutiny over drone strikes and cyber operations.
For Southern Maryland, where military service defines one in five jobs, the policy’s indirect chill could obscure details on how $10 billion in annual Patuxent contracts fund community programs or strain local infrastructure. Readers deserve unfiltered facts on these ties, not filtered narratives. As the walkout demonstrates, the press — national and local — will adapt from afar, but at the cost of immediacy and depth. Hegseth’s team has not identified a single reporter-led breach justifying the overhaul, raising questions about motives tied to administration preferences for favorable coverage.
This episode underscores journalism’s role as democracy’s sentinel, particularly in defense-heavy regions like Southern Maryland. Outlets may pivot to Freedom of Information Act requests or Capitol Hill sources, but the policy’s shadow lingers, testing the resilience of a free press in an era of institutional distrust.