The U.S. Defense Department has announced plans to relocate media offices from the Pentagon after a federal judge ruled in favor of The New York Times in a lawsuit challenging restrictions on journalists’ access to the facility. This was confirmed by a department official on Monday.
According to department spokesperson Sean Parnell, the well-known “Correspondents’ Corridor” within the Pentagon, a space journalists have utilized for decades to report on military affairs, will be shut down immediately. Reporters will eventually have the option to operate from an “annex” located outside the main building. However, Parnell did not specify a timeline for when this alternate space would be operational.
This policy shift is the latest in a series of disputes regarding media access during President Donald Trump’s administration, which has been noted for limiting traditional media outlets while favoring conservative and pro-Trump media.
The New York Times filed a lawsuit against the Pentagon and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in December, arguing that the revised credentialing policy infringed upon journalists’ constitutional rights, specifically free speech and due process. In protest, numerous reporters left the building rather than submit to the imposed restrictions.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman in Washington, D.C., ruled in favor of The New York Times. He mandated the Pentagon to restore press credentials to seven of the newspaper’s journalists and invalidated certain restrictions that were placed on news reporting.
Judge Friedman highlighted that the “undisputed evidence” indicated the policy aimed to exclude “disfavored journalists” in favor of those more aligned and compliant with government perspectives, a clear violation of viewpoint discrimination laws.
Parnell said the Defense Department disagrees with the ruling and is pursuing an appeal. He said security concerns prompted restrictions on press access, a claim that journalists have rejected.
Under the latest Pentagon rules announced Monday, journalists will still have access to the Pentagon for press conferences and interviews arranged through the department’s public affairs team, but they will have to be escorted, Parnell wrote on social media.
The current Pentagon press corps is comprised mostly of conservative outlets that agreed to the policy. Reporters from outlets that refused to consent to the new rules, including from The Associated Press, have continued reporting on the military.
The AP, meanwhile, is awaiting a decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court of Appeals on its separate lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s administration. The AP contends that Trump’s White House team punished it by reducing its access to presidential events because the outlet hasn’t followed his lead in renaming the Gulf of Mexico.
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