Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's team appears to have decided that bad angles are a national security threat. The Pentagon has blocked outside press photographers from recent briefings on the US-Israeli conflict with Iran after major wire services published images of Hegseth that aides didn't like, the Washington Post reports, citing "two people familiar with the decision who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation." Hegseth's staff considered the images "unflattering," the sources say.
Photographers from the AP, Reuters, and Getty were allowed into a March 2 briefing following the strike that killed Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but they were barred from the next two sessions on March 4 and March 10. Since then, only Pentagon staff photographers have been allowed into the briefings.
- The move lands amid already high tensions between Hegseth, a former Fox News host, and the press, the Post reports. Last fall, hundreds of Pentagon reporters surrendered their credentials rather than sign a policy barring them from seeking any information the government hadn't pre-approved, a rule now being challenged in federal court by the New York Times.
- "As the Times has long said, there is a clear importance and public service to allowing journalists to report fully on the US military," said Charles Stadtlander, a spokesman for the newspaper, per the AP. "This includes photojournalists, who deserve access and credentialing to attend Pentagon briefings."
- In a statement, Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson did not mention the photos, instead citing "effective" use of limited briefing-room space. "Photographs from the briefings are immediately released online for the public and press to use," she said. "If that hurts the business model for certain news outlets, then they should consider applying for a Pentagon press credential."
- The current Pentagon press corps is dominated by outlets that agreed to the new rules, though some previously credentialed journalists negotiated limited access for the March 2 briefing after the Iran strikes.
- It's unclear which specific image, if any, triggered the photo ban. The National Press Photographers Association blasted the move as a potential First Amendment problem. "A free press cannot function if government officials decide that only favorable images of public officials may be created or distributed," NPPA president Alex Garcia said. He said the ban "shows an astonishingly poor sense of priorities in the midst of a war and is, for a public servant, not a good look."
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