Pentagon Redesignates Press Office As Classified, Bars Journalists
Defense Department redesignated the press office as a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility and barred journalists as speechwriters handling classified material move into the space.
The GuardianPentagon bars journalists from entering its press office citing re-designation
MS NOWPentagon bars journalists from its press office after designating it a ‘classified space’
Epoch TimesPentagon Designates Press Room as Classified Space
ABC NewsPentagon bars journalists from press office, saying it's become a 'classified space'
Overview
The Defense Department has redesignated the Pentagon Press Office as a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility and barred journalists from entering, acting Pentagon press secretary Joel Valdez said.
Valdez said the redesignation occurred because speechwriters from the Office of the Secretary of War now share the facility and routinely handle classified material that requires SIPRNet access.
The move comes amid escalating tensions between the U.S. media and the second Trump administration and followed Pentagon rules that led many credentialed reporters to surrender Pentagon badges last October, news coverage said.
The department earlier assigned workspaces to roughly 60 journalists from right-leaning outlets after removing several mainstream outlets, and a major newspaper filed a lawsuit on May 18 challenging escort and access policies, news coverage said.
An interim escort policy implemented in March after a March ruling by U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman was later found to violate his order, and an appeals court stayed part of that ruling while the government appealed, the articles said.
Analysis
Center-leaning sources frame the story as a pattern of Pentagon restrictions on press access by using evaluative verbs ("restricting media access") and conflict language ("escalating tensions"). They prioritize sources sympathetic to the press—walkouts, lawsuits, legal rulings—while presenting the Pentagon's denial mainly as quoted source content, implying government curtailment.