{"id":283749,"date":"2026-07-01T16:43:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-01T16:43:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/283749\/"},"modified":"2026-07-01T16:43:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-01T16:43:23","slug":"judge-tells-pentagon-to-halt-escort-policy-for-journalists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/283749\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge tells Pentagon to halt escort policy for journalists"},"content":{"rendered":"

A federal judge has ordered the Defense Department<\/a> to temporarily halt a requirement that journalists be accompanied by an official escort<\/a>, another legal setback for the Trump administration\u2019s efforts to restrict media access at the Pentagon<\/a>. It was not immediately clear whether the order applied only to reporters from The New York Times, which filed the lawsuit, or to the entire press corps.<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman in Washington said that policy violated the First Amendment. He issued a preliminary ruling<\/a> Tuesday barring the requirement while the Times continues its protracted legal battle against the department\u2019s restrictions. <\/p>\n

While the order\u2019s language suggested the judge\u2019s decision was directed only at the Times, the escort policy itself applies to all journalists. <\/p>\n

The newspaper in May sued the Defense Department for the second time in five months. The lawsuits have played into an escalating tension between the U.S. media and the Republican administration, both in the public arena and the courts. <\/p>\n

The Times hailed Friedman\u2019s ruling. <\/p>\n

\u201cToday\u2019s well-reasoned decision reaffirms the First Amendment rights of the press to cover the Pentagon without restrictions designed to prevent the public from knowing what the military is doing,\u201d said Charlie Stadtlander, a spokesperson. \u201cThe court recognized that the Pentagon\u2019s hastily implemented new policy was a clear violation of the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell posted on X late Tuesday that the department \u201cstrongly disagrees\u201d with Friedman\u2019s decision. \u201cThis ruling strips away reasonable security measures and will make it easier for sensitive and classified information to reach our adversaries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parnell argued further that \u201cunescorted access to the Pentagon allowed journalists to observe activity patterns and develop relationships that contributed to repeated unauthorized disclosures of operational plans and intelligence. The court\u2019s order effectively restores that risky environment at a time when protecting our military\u2019s secrets is more critical than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Times first sued in December over rules imposed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth seeking to limit media access.<\/p>\n

The escort policy was implemented in March after a ruling by Friedman that had struck down earlier restrictions. He said they violated the rights of Times reporter Julian E. Barnes and the paper.<\/p>\n

The following month, the judge ruled that the interim policy violated his March order. But the escort policy remained in place<\/a> when an appeals court stayed part of Friedman\u2019s ruling while the government appealed. The appeals process is ongoing.<\/p>\n

The Times and other outlets walked out<\/a> of the Pentagon in October rather than agree to Hegseth\u2019s restrictions. They continue to cover the U.S. military from outside the building. A new press corps approved by the department currently occupies the Pentagon space.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A federal judge has ordered the Defense Department to temporarily halt a requirement that journalists be accompanied by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[288,10812,419,24027,153,157,417,70,32445,2850,2849,9,24,11,10,92357,1351,87,1350,421,2852,420],"class_list":["post-283749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-business","tag-charlie-stadtlander","tag-courts","tag-district-of-columbia","tag-donald-trump","tag-entertainment","tag-general-news","tag-journalism","tag-julian-e-barnes","tag-lawsuits","tag-legal-proceedings","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-paul-l-friedman","tag-pete-hegseth","tag-politics","tag-sean-parnell","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states-government","tag-washington-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}