Judge blocks Pentagon’s latest bid to limit press access in scathing ruling

By Devan Cole, CNN

(CNN) — A federal judge on Thursday blocked the Pentagon’s latest bid to limit press access, tearing into the Department of Defense in a stinging ruling that warned “suppression of political speech is the mark of an autocracy, not a democracy.”

US District Judge Paul Friedman blasted the department for attempting an end-run around his decision voiding parts of a restrictive press policy rolled out by Secretary Pete Hegseth last year, saying the Pentagon had flouted his ruling when it quickly implemented a tighter policy.

“The Department cannot simply reinstate an unlawful policy under the guise of taking ‘new’ action and expect the court to look the other way,” Friedman wrote in the ruling in a case brought by The New York Times.

Under the new policy, Friedman said, the Pentagon “has invoked slightly different language” but is still violating the constitutional rights of national security reporters who have long been granted access to the department’s sprawling headquarters in Northern Virginia.

“The curtailment of First Amendment rights is dangerous at any time, and even more so in a time of war,” the appointee of former President Bill Clinton wrote. “Suppression of political speech is the mark of an autocracy, not a democracy — as the Framers recognized when they drafted the First Amendment.”

The judge said officials at the Pentagon cannot enforce the new policy against several Pentagon reporters at the newspaper and ordered it to take steps to restore their physical access to the building.

“The Court cannot conclude this opinion without noting once again what this case is really about: the attempt by the Secretary of Defense to dictate the information received by the American people, to control the message so that the public hears and sees only what the Secretary and the Trump Administration want them to hear and see,” Friedman wrote. “The Constitution demands better. The American public demands better, too.”

Last month, Friedman struck down several provisions of the policy issued by Hegseth last year that enabled the Pentagon to suspend or revoke credentials based on reporting. But he left in place other parts of the policy that had been in effect in earlier iterations and were not subject to the legal challenge.

The department quickly went back to the drawing board and issued a new policy that included several dramatic changes to the amount of access national security reporters have to the building.

Most notably, the policy put out following Friedman’s ruling closed the “Correspondents’ Corridor” inside the Pentagon building — where journalists have worked for decades — and required reporters entering the building to be accompanied by an escort at all times.

“The court 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 wrote in his ruling Thursday.

The Pentagon plans to appeal the ruling, spokesman Sean Parnell said.

“The Department has at all times complied with the Court’s Order,” he said in a statement on X, arguing that the revised policy addressed the concerns Friedman raised in last month’s 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 added.

Ted Boutrous, a lawyer for the Times, said in a statement that Friedman’s decision “powerfully vindicates both the court’s authority and the First Amendment’s protections of independent journalism.”

But the Freedom of the Press Foundation called on Friedman to go further and consider punitive action against the Trump administration, such as attorney disciplinary referrals, sanctions or contempt of court findings.

“The administration will likely play more games to avoid complying with today’s order as well,” FPF Chief of Advocacy Seth Stern said in a statement. “Hopefully, Judge Friedman will rise to the moment.”

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This story has been updated with additional details.

CNN’s Piper Hudspeth Blackburn contributed to this report.