The Pentagon says it will require accredited journalists at the headquarters to prevent the pledge to refrain from reporting the information that has not been declared to the version – including unknown information.
Journalists who do not adhere to the risks of politics lose the credentials that provide access to the Pentagon, according to a memorandum of 17 pages distributed on Friday and that increase the restrictions of the media imposed by the administration of President Donald Trump.
“The information must be approved for the public release by an appropriate authorization official before it was issued, even if it is not classified,” says guidance. The signature form includes a set of safety requirements for the Pentagon.
Defenders of the press freedoms condemned the requirements of non -disclosure as an attack on the independent press. The new Pentagon restrictions reach Trump It expands threats, lawsuits, and government pressure It reconfigures the American scene.
“If the news related to the army should be approved by the government first, the public no longer gets independent reports. It only gets what officials want to see,” said Mike Balasamo, head of the National Press Club, a national law enforcement editor at Associated Press. “This should alert every American.”
Defense Minister Beit Higseth, the former Fox News channel, highlighted the restrictions in the social media post on X.
“The press” does not manage the Pentagon – the press is not allowed to roam in the halls of a safe facility. “Wear a badge and follow the rules – or go home.”
Pentagon this year He directed many news organizations While a series of restrictions are imposed on the press that includes Journalists have banned the entry of large areas of Pentagon Without a government accompaniment – the areas in which the press was able in previous departments because it covers the activities of the most powerful army in the world.
Pentagon Be embarrassed Early in the period of Higseth when the editor -in -chief of the Atlantic Ocean, Jeffrey Goldberg, was included in unintentionally in a group chat on the application of the signal correspondence, as the Minister of Defense discussed the upcoming military strikes plans in Yemen. Former National Security Adviser Trump, Mike Waltz, took over the inclusion of Goldberg and was transferred to another job.
The Ministry of Defense was also An embarrassing of leakage To the New York Times, which the billionaire Ilon Musk had to obtain a briefing on the plans of the US military if the war broke out with China. This briefing has never occurred, based on President Donald Trump’s orders, and Higseth hung Pentagon officials as part of the investigation of how this news came out.
On Saturday, the Professional Journalists Association objected to the Pentagon’s move, describing it as “worrying”.
“This policy holds pre -restrictions – the most freedom of the press is under the first amendment – a dangerous step towards government censorship,” she said in a statement on Saturday. “Attempts to silence the press under the guise of” security “are part of a disturbing pattern of the growing government hostility towards transparency and democratic standards.
Matt Murray, the executive editor of the Washington Post, said in the pillars of the paper on Saturday that the new policy is contrary to what is good for the American public.
Murray said: “The constitution protects the right to report the activities of elected and democratic government officials,” Murray said. “Any attempt to control correspondence and access by the government contradict the first amendment and against the public interest.”