Judge blocks Pentagon from imposing new press restrictions

A federal judge ruled Thursday that the Pentagon cannot impose its new press restrictions, which he claimed was an effort to negate his previous order.

U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman last month dismissed parts of the Pentagon's guidelines released last year and ordered it to restore the press passes of seven journalists for the New York Times. 

The War Department then changed its protocols late last month for its media briefing room, which includes the relocation of reporters to workspace outside the Pentagon. It also closed the correspondents' corridor within the Pentagon.

Friedman said in his latest ruling that he “has no choice but to conclude that the Department’s abrupt closure of the Correspondents’ Corridor and its ban on credentialed journalists traveling unescorted through the Pentagon are not security measures or efforts to make good on prior commitments but rather transparent attempts to negate the impact of this Court’s Order.”

The judge also said War Secretary Pete Hegseth is attempting to control the message that Americans receive from the Pentagon and Trump administration in violation of the Constitution's design for a free press. 

"The curtailment of First Amendment rights is dangerous at any time, even more so in a time of war," Friedman wrote. "Suppression of political speech is the mark of an autocracy, not a democracy — as the framers recognized when they drafted the First Amendment.”

Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said the Trump administration plans to appeal the ruling and claimed the department has attempted to abide by the judge's previous ruling.

"The Department remains committed to press access at the Pentagon while fulfilling its statutory obligation to ensure the safe and secure operation of the Pentagon Reservation," he said, according to Deadline.

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.