Pentagon Wants It to Be Illegal for Reporters to Ask “Unauthorized” Questions

The Trump administration's Department of Justice filed a brief arguing that journalists asking government officials for nonpublic information constitute unlawful solicitation not protected by the First Amendment, marking an escalation of the Pentagon's policy to revoke press credentials for publishing "unauthorized" material. Federal District Judge Paul Friedman recently struck down the Pentagon's restrictions, but the administration pledged to immediately appeal the decision on Monday after reissuing largely identical rules. The DOJ's legal theory mirrors a discredited 2017 argument used by Laredo, Texas police to arrest citizen journalist Patricia Villarreal for asking about local tragedies — a case the Supreme Court declined to review this week. Major news outlets including the New York Times, AP, and Fox News surrendered their Pentagon press credentials rather than sign the restrictive rules, leaving war coverage to outlets like Turning Point USA's Frontlines and Mike Lindell's LindellTV. The administration could invoke the 1917 Espionage Act against reporters, as it has against Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, if it succeeds in redefining routine newsgathering as a criminal act.