The longtime publisher of Stars and Stripes is stepping down, closing out a decades-spanning career at the military newspaper as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon pushes for greater editorial control and seeks to remove what it has described as “woke distractions.”
Max D. Lederer Jr. told staff in a Tuesday memo that he will retire at the end of September, a decision he also discussed in an interview with Stars and Stripes. In the memo, reviewed by The Associated Press, Lederer — the second full-time civilian to hold the publisher’s post — said it had “become clear that my philosophy of leadership, and my understanding of the value and mission of Stars and Stripes, differ in fundamental ways from the direction the leadership of the Department of Defense has for the organization.”
His departure follows the Pentagon’s firing less than four months ago of Jacqueline Smith, the newspaper’s ombudsman, whose role was to protect its editorial independence. Stars and Stripes receives partial funding from the Defense Department, but it has long maintained a tradition of operating independently from military and government leadership.
“No one should be surprised that they’re kicking out the one person charged by Congress with protecting Stars and Stripes’ editorial independence,” Smith wrote in a column.
The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Stars and Stripes has recently drawn attention for its reporting on conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, including concerns about sailors’ mental health during the aircraft carrier’s lengthy deployment — issues President Donald Trump has downplayed.
The retirement comes amid broader government-driven changes at the military publication.
Seven months earlier, the Pentagon said in a social media post that it planned to essentially remake the newspaper so it would align more closely with the department’s current messaging.
The secretary’s spokesman, Sean Parnell, wrote on on X in January that the Pentagon “is returning Stars and Stripes to its original mission: reporting for our warfighters.” He said the department will “refocus its content away from woke distractions.”
“Stars and Stripes will be custom tailored to our warfighters,” Parnell wrote. “It will focus on warfighting, weapons systems, fitness, lethality, survivability and ALL THINGS MILITARY. No more repurposed DC gossip columns; no more Associated Press reprints.”
More broadly, the developments at Stars and Stripes come against a backdrop of increased efforts by Hegseth to control media coverage of the department.
Last year, officials attempted to impose restrictions on journalists working inside the Pentagon, which, in turn, led most news outlets to turn in their access badges and walk out.
Then this summer, the Pentagon took another step and declared its press office a classified space — instituting a policy that journalists must be accompanied by an escort on Pentagon grounds. That policy is being challenged in court. In mid-July, a panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said the policy could stand, overturning a lower court decision.
In her April column titled “The Pentagon is trying to silence me,” Smith, the former ombudsman, expressed concern over increasing restrictions on the media.
“For nearly a year, Pentagon leadership has placed more and more restrictions on the mainstream media,” she wrote. “The New York Times sued and when the Defense/War Department lost in court, instead of following the judge’s ruling Secretary Hegseth and company pivoted, finding another way to restrict journalists.”
Of Stars and Stripes, Smith wrote: “This newspaper has a long history of commitment to the military community and to journalistic values. Please don’t let it be controlled by Pentagon brass.”
The departing publisher objected to certain changes
Lederer was not made available for an interview with the AP. In the interview with Stars and Stripes, he said he did not feel the modernization efforts the Pentagon announced in March were appropriate, in particular a transitioning of print products to digital — fearing that would limit accessibility for troops.
“I don’t feel that there’s a full recognition of the value of multiple platforms versus only a digital platform,” Lederer was quoted as saying.
In a letter to congressional leaders that was seen by the AP, Rufus Friday, the chair of Stars and Stripes’ advisory board of publishers, wrote that the development “threatens Stripes’s editorial independence.”
Roughly half of Stars and Stripes’ budget comes from the Pentagon, and its staff members are considered Defense Department employees.
The outlet’s mission statement emphasizes that it is “editorially independent of interference from outside its own editorial chain-of-command” and that it is unique among news organizations tied to the Defense Department in being “governed by the principles of the First Amendment.”
The newspaper traces its lineage to the Civil War. It has been reporting about the military steadily since World War II, to an audience mainly of service members stationed overseas.
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Jocelyn Noveck writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP.
