Easy to overlook this particular ‘autocracy in action’ thread amidst the spate of recent outrages…
The time of the legitimate White House Press Corps would be better spent investigating real stories about the Trump Admin than hanging around asking these lying bozos questions.
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec.bsky.social) October 23, 2025 at 12:14 PM
Per the Poynter Institute, “The Pentagon’s new press corps — journalists or advocates?”:
For years, the Department of Defense — one of the most important, scrutinized and reported-on departments in our government — has been covered extensively by reporters from inside the Pentagon. This included journalists from some of the most respected and accomplished news outlets in the business, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC, CBS, ABC, and CNN, just to name a few. In fact, CBS’s Eleanor Watson noted, “During D-Day, CBS News radio correspondent Joseph F. McCaffrey reported live from the Pentagon about the strategy and General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s background.”…
But those outlets are no longer in the Pentagon after refusing to sign a new press policy that prohibits journalists from accessing or soliciting information that the Defense Department doesn’t make available to them, including even unclassified information.
It’s troubling which news outlets are no longer at the Pentagon.
Just as troubling is which outlets and so-called “journalists” are.
In a statement on Wednesday, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said more than 60 journalists have agreed to the new rules. He wrote that they represent “a broad spectrum of new media outlets and independent journalists.”…
According to the Post’s Harwell and Scott Nover, the outlets now supposedly doing the digging and working the halls inside the Pentagon include Tim Pool’s Timcast, the Gateway Pundit, the Post Millennial, Human Events, the National Pulse, Turning Point USA and a Substack newsletter called Washington Reporter. Then there’s the very pro-Trump One America News, the Federalist and the Epoch Times. It also includes Lindell TV — as in Mike Lindell, the MyPillow guy and ardent supporter of President Donald Trump. And, the Pentagon said, there are a bunch of “independent journalists.” Although none were mentioned by name, it’s a good guess to say that the “independent journalists” are certainly big on “independent” but not so big on “journalists.”
All are clearly OK with the Pentagon’s press restrictions. That alone should make anyone question their journalistic chops. Meanwhile, most of them have proven to be strong supporters of Trump, his administration and the entire MAGA movement…
As I wrote last week, just because places like The New York Times, The Washington Post and the networks are no longer inside the Pentagon doesn’t mean those places will stop reporting on the Department of Defense. But, undoubtedly, their jobs just got a tad bit harder in terms of having access to those they cover.
They aren’t, however, going to give up, even though Parnell claimed those who didn’t sign the new policy “self-deport(ed)” from the Pentagon.
Barbara Starr, who covered the Pentagon at CNN for two decades and served as a board member of the Pentagon Press Association, tweeted, “First we wish any legitimate journalist well on their journey to cover the news. But ‘your’ government announcement of a next gen press corps is shall we say beyond odd. The Pentagon press corps still is working every day no matter how afraid of it you all seem to be. ‘Self deport’? Naw. Too busy working!”…
Here's who @scottnover.bsky.social and I have confirmed so far.
All right-wing bloggers and influencers who
* agreed to the press restrictions refused by established reporters
* are known for soft-touch treatment of the Trump administration
* will now get special access to the "Department of War"— Drew Harwell (@drewharwell.com) October 22, 2025 at 2:13 PM
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An important thing about these rw grifting types is not only are they intellectually dishonest, they're really fucking lazy.
So this is gonna be something.— Schnorkles O'Bork (@schnorkles.bsky.social) October 23, 2025 at 10:44 AM
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Extremely funny that INFOWARS has agreed not to publish anything without the explicit consent of the US government
— Simon Little ?? (@simonplittle.ca) October 23, 2025 at 1:52 PM
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lots of little hairline cracks starting to show
— GHOULLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) October 16, 2025 at 3:18 PM
this woman's not going to become a democrat or anything, but demoralizing the base so that, say, one in ten stay home is a landslide win
— GHOULLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) October 16, 2025 at 3:21 PM
Baud
They gave their sycophants, but we have Anne Laurie.
Miss Bianca
Eh, the Legacy Press can always go back to the well of “Biden be so old” stories. Since that worked out so well for all of us..
dmsilev
It’s a mixed curse, shall we say. Yes, the official access of the traditional media to the Pentagon and (maybe eventually the White House) lets them directly question officials and otherwise report stories, but many many times that’s been used just to suck up to those same officials. Cutting off the official access means that if those outlets want stories, they’ll need to do it the old fashioned way. Which doesn’t necessarily involve regurgitating the official line.
Jay
@dmsilev:
or the F’n MSM just does their usual sanewashing, but of the Pentagon’s “Press Pool’s” game of telephone.
zhena gogolia
OT, RIP June Lockhart
MattF
It’s just the itty-bittiest bit of irony that ‘SecWar’ is an ex-FOX entertainer.
NotMax
Unfair and unbalanced.
Scout211
@zhena gogolia: I was about to post that.
But I would have said, Oh man, Lassie’s mom died. ☹️
She was 100.
Also too, Will Robinson’s mom. Ah, memories.
Another Scott
@dmsilev: +1
And the public may not be any worse informed, either.
Under Biden, I think that just about every cabinet agency had a public affairs office that probably did daily briefings. The gatekeeping giant mass media outfits didn’t feel the need to tell us much, if anything. about those daily briefings.
Grr…
Reporters, and the rest of us, can browse the web for information. Yeah, there’s little since September 30 at war.gov/News/ but that’s potentially related to the lack of a CR.
An independent press that tells readers the truth about what the government is doing is important. There are too few outlets like that these days – credentialed or not.
Roone Arledge has a lot to answer for…
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Nukular Biskits
AL, you are a national treasure.
Jackie
O/T Let’s see if Canada runs the Reagan anti-tariffs ad again, tonight ;-)
Edited for formatting
scav
It’s poorly built, jerry-rigged propaganda that needs such obvious, permanent, official props.
Handy to have a list of names of the chosen propellors of war. (team motto: when the fans spin the shit.”)
trnc
No way does this demoralize 1 in 10 magas. Maybe 1 or 2 in each state.
Nukular Biskits
@Jackie:
You’d think our supposedly liberal media would ask him what, specifically, was “misrepresented”.
ETA: Corrected grammar.
TS
Not sure the Washington Post will be missed. Their latest reporting is to attack Mamdani – presumably to raise support for Cuomo
If anyone wants to read it – I’ll add a gift link, but I didn’t get far past that opening sentence. They will always find a reason to attack anyone who is not a RW white christian male.
Nukular Biskits
@TS:
I could be wrong (and my own understanding of what constitutes “Zionism” and, thus, “anti-Zionism”), I don’t recall Mamdani expressing any such thing.
But, then, the WaPo has become nothing more than another rightwing megaphone.
Jackie
@Nukular Biskits: It’s being covered pretty extensively on MSNBC and CNN. Both networks have shown Canada’s version and Reagan’s full speech.
No deceitful editing was found by either network. Last night the ad ran during the 7th inning stretch.
WTFGhost
@Miss Bianca: Hey, Republicans promised them, “Keep pimping how Biden is practically a drooling husk, and we’ll give you *plenty* of source material from Republicans!” and now, they have an entire Republican federal government to cover, so, they’ve been well paid, with lots of Republican source material, and eventually, some best sellers, entitled, “I knew Trump was killing thousands of people, and I didn’t care until after the midterms, because my book would sell even better then!”
Nukular Biskits
@Jackie:
I think the DNC should run a version of it.
Repeatedly.
In every swing district.
dc
“I”m still maga.” In other words, I’m still a hateful idiot, and even I can see that this is wrong.
Jackie
@Nukular Biskits:
That’s a great idea!
trnc
@Jackie: They should run the full speech with no edits.
Marc
@Nukular Biskits: If T demands that the WP publish a story with a particular spin, the only acceptable response is: Yes, Sir, we are giving our full attention to this matter.
Castor Canadensis
@Jackie:
Note the word “paused”.
Jackie
@trnc: That’s way longer than the 7th inning stretch LOL
HinTN
@TS: And why, exactly, is the WaPo so worried about Mamdani? Because their oligarch owner is terrified of that message! GOO
ETA: @Marc: yep
Baud
Interesting
Jackie
@Castor Canadensis:
I did. The next three games (starting Mon) will be played in LA. Should the series return to Toronto, I’ll be watching to see if the ad is resumed! I bet it will.
TONYG
Nothing to worry about! It’s not as though the administration is preparing for an imperialist war in South America!
Chief Oshkosh
@Nukular Biskits:
Hell, they should run it in every soybean and cattle district. They know who is fucking them over. They just need to admit it to themselves and they need to be reminded of it every fucking second of the day.
TONYG
@HinTN: Everyone on the right is freaking out about Mamdani. He’s a dangerous commie, you see, with that dark skin.
Jay
@TONYG:
Worse than that, he is joyous and fun.
Jackie
@TONYG:
The only people who matter are NYC voters. Eric Adams complexion didn’t matter; although his ethics should have.
iKropoclast
Sure they’re stenographers, but apparently they draw the line at only doing stenography for one institutional voice.
iKropoclast
@TS: More Islamophobia under cover of anti-anti-Semitism. You’re right, these outlets shouldn’t be missed. At least they’re bringing in people who many will recognize should not be taken seriously.