Next Time, Impeach Pete Hegseth for Press Censorship - The Intercept

Seth Stern is the director of advocacy for Freedom of the Press Foundation.

Before the effort to impeach him failed Tuesday, Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth lashed out at a group he despises even more than “beardos” and “weirdos”: the press. His security team threatened to physically remove journalists from a news briefing, Hegseth’s first in several months, if they didn’t maintain decorum.  

It’s nothing new for Hegseth. He may want to pump soldiers up with testosterone, but he’s spent the last couple years trying to neuter the Fourth Estate. It’s unfortunate that his unconstitutional attacks on journalists were not part of the official case for removing him. Next time, they should be. And Congress should not stop with Hegseth. 

The impeachment resolution Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., brought against Hegseth included eight articles, alleging that the so-called Secretary of War acted illegally in military campaigns in Iran, Venezuela, and the Caribbean, among other things. The resolution touched on free speech violations – Article VI is about Hegseth’s retaliation campaign against Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., for reminding troops of their right to refuse illegal orders – but it didn’t mention the press. 

A recap is in order: In February of 2025, Hegseth’s Pentagon evicted the New York Times, NBC, Politico, and NPR from their dedicated workspaces in the building, replacing them largely with sycophantic right-wing outlets like Breitbart and One America News Network. Some elements of the fawning right-wing press were on full display during his Tuesday press conference: “How does it make you feel,” asked a reporter from an outlet called Real America’s Voice, “when our own politicians don’t support taking out the narco-traffickers that kill their own constituents?” 

Months later, Hegseth concocted a requirement that journalists who wish to access the Pentagon pledge not to solicit unauthorized information from the government, under threat of losing their credentials. Dozens of reporters from outlets across the political spectrum turned in their access badges rather than comply. They were replaced, once again, by loyalists who could be counted on to treat Hegseth and his fragile ego with kid gloves. 

A judge soon struck down the pledge policy as an unconstitutional effort to force out disfavored journalists. The Pentagon immediately issued new restrictions on unauthorized disclosures that were, in some ways, even worse than the originals. The judge rejected that policy too. Hegseth also imposed a requirement for reporters to be escorted around the Pentagon, which is still working its way through the courts. 

Hegseth’s Pentagon cracked down on the military’s newspaper, Stars and Stripes, barring it from briefings and demanding it stop publishing “woke” content. After all, it used to run columns from that well-known leftist Ann Coulter. His Pentagon then fired key personnel and otherwise did everything it could think of to try to turn Stars and Stripes into a propaganda organ unrecognizable to its readership – mostly troops, veterans, and their families. 

It gets even pettier: Hegseth’s staff barred press photographers from briefings after they published pictures of him that he found unflattering.

Hegseth’s illegal war on transparency has extended not just to reporters but also to their sources. He forced staff to take unreliable polygraph tests to identify leakers until the White House itself halted the effort after a Trump loyalist complained about being targeted. He’s formed a joint task force with the Justice Department to push for prosecution of leakers and adopted President Donald Trump’s alarming habit of equating national security reporting to “treason.” 

There will almost certainly be another effort to impeach Hegseth in the next Congress, if not sooner. Censorship may not be the lede — alleged international war crimes understandably tend to take the spotlight over other infractions — but it also shouldn’t be an afterthought. 

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And while they’re impeaching wartime censors, Congress shouldn’t forget about FCC Chair Brendan Carr. He has defied federal law, the First Amendment, and the FCC’s own rules and guidelines in his incessant efforts to turn the agency into Trump’s journalism police. And critical reporting on the Iran war – which the Republican party now apparently agrees deserved criticism all along – has been one of Carr’s most frequent targets. 

At the beginning of the war, after Trump fumed at accurate coverage he disliked, Carr – who wears Trump’s gilded face as a lapel pin and sips from a mug depicting himself as Trump’s pit bull – promptly reposted the president’s attack. He warned that broadcasters airing “hoaxes and news distortions” should “correct course before their license renewals come up.” 

An emboldened Trump responded the same night, posting that outlets spreading “fake news” about the war should “be brought up on Charges for TREASON,” adding that he was “thrilled” Carr was investigating the licenses of media outlets across the country.

Then, after April’s purported ceasefire, CNN reported a statement from Iran’s Supreme National Security Council claiming victory. Trump took to Truth Social to announce a purported investigation into whether CNN committed some unspecified crime by publishing the quote. Carr piled on, accusing CNN, which the FCC does not regulate, of pushing a “hoax headline” that “requires accountability,” implying that licensees who aired similar reporting would face his wrath. But the statement was real. Trump just would’ve preferred CNN air a different one. 

Of course, Carr’s censorship campaigns are myriad and many have little to do with the war. But his arguably most egregious (and impeachable) offense did, albeit indirectly. 

Last year, Carr inexplicably stalled the FCC’s consideration of then-CBS News parent Paramount’s merger with David Ellison’s Skydance until Paramount paid $16 million to settle Trump’s frivolous lawsuit over “60 Minutes’” editing of an interview with Kamala Harris. He approved the merger two days after Trump said he’d received his dirty money. Essentially, he aided Trump in laundering a bribe through the courts.

Carr – who knows better, having once written that editorial judgment “should be beyond the reach of any government official” – also used his leverage over the merger to give himself and his delegates a seat at CBS’s editors desk, extracting unconstitutional editorial concessions from Ellison’s team. CBS has since been widely criticized for softening its coverage of Trump’s agenda, including (among other things) echoing administration narratives on the U.S. military operations like the war in Iran and the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Facilitating likely bribery is the epitome of an impeachable offense. Republicans might not vote for impeachment, but after all the backlash Carr has received from the right, they also can’t credibly accuse Democrats of some kind of partisan witch hunt. Congress should not let the opportunity to hold Carr accountable pass them by.

Lawmakers need to acknowledge that the reporters the administration called traitors got it right all along, and that those who attempted to censor wartime journalism did a disservice to the Constitution and the American people. Hegseth and Carr should both be impeached, with the press they tried to muzzle freely reporting on every minute of the proceedings.

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We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking.

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