US Defense Department bars journalists from its press office

Media freedom advocates condemn move as latest effort to curtail independent reporting on the US military.

The United States Department of Defense has barred journalists from its press office, the latest move by the Pentagon to restrict media access since President Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

Acting Pentagon Press Secretary Joel Valdez said on Monday that the administration had re-designated the office as a “Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility” due to its use by speechwriters with access to classified government information.

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“These speechwriters routinely handle classified material and require SIPRNet access,” Valdez said in a statement provided to Al Jazeera, referring to the secure computer network used by the Pentagon to share classified information.

“As a result, journalists will no longer be permitted to enter the office space. Access to the office of the Assistant to the Secretary of War for Public Affairs and to the Press Secretary remains available by appointment only,” Valdez added, using the Trump administration’s preferred title for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The Washington Post first reported the change.

The move follows a slew of steps by the Trump administration to curtail the ability of US media outlets to report on the military and other areas of the government.

In March, the Defense Department said it would no longer allow media outlets to maintain offices at the Pentagon after a judge sided with The New York Times in a lawsuit challenging the imposition of new rules for obtaining press credentials.

The Pentagon also announced that journalists would require an official escort while inside the complex, a policy that The New York Times is seeking to overturn in a separate lawsuit filed in May.

The National Press Club, the main professional organisation for journalists in the US, condemned the latest restrictions as a “troubling escalation” in the Trump administration’s efforts to curtail media scrutiny of the Pentagon.

“Independent reporting on the US military is not optional,” National Press Club President Mark Schoeff Jr said in a statement.

“When journalists are pushed farther from the institutions they cover, the American people are left with less information, less transparency, and less oversight. Any effort to restrict that access should alarm everyone who values a free and informed society.”

The Freedom of the Press Foundation, a nonprofit advocacy organisation, also criticised the move.

“It’s rare for anything other than disingenuous spin and outright lies to come out of the Pentagon’s press office these days, so it’s hard to imagine what basis they have to call the space classified,” Seth Stern, chief of advocacy at the organisation, told Al Jazeera.

“The only thing sensitive or confidential about the information released by Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon is that it’s not true.”