The Intercept reported on August 24, 2026 that U.S. Central Command maintains a secret directory of blacklisted journalists, a practice confirmed by a Pentagon spokesperson.
It lands at the end of a long escalation against the press at Hegseth's Pentagon. In May 2025 Hegseth barred credentialed reporters from most of the building without an escort. The Pentagon then required journalists to pledge not to gather unclassified information unless the government authorized its release, on pain of losing their credentials. The New York Times sued, and in March 2026 a federal judge struck that policy down as unconstitutional.
Hegseth responded by shuttering a decades-old Pentagon pressroom and introducing polygraph testing to hunt leaks. In August 2026 he fired journalists at Stars and Stripes, the editorially independent military newspaper.
A blacklist is different in kind from restricted access. Access rules apply to everyone; a list names individuals and follows them.