By Alexandra Bruell
The New York Times and national security reporter Julian E. Barnes filed a second lawsuit against the Pentagon, escalating their fight over new rules restricting press access to military officials and the Defense Department's main building.
The Times filed the suit against the department, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, his adviser Timothy Parlatore and Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell, alleging that a new policy requiring journalists to enter the Pentagon with an escort is retaliatory toward the Times and violates the First and Fifth Amendments.
Unlike its prior suit, this second complaint names Parlatore, describing him as an architect of the Pentagon's new press-access policy. It specifically targets the interim press policy -- the latest version of rules limiting access to the Pentagon, which require all journalists to have an escort inside the department's main building. A judge earlier ruled that key elements of a prior press policy, which allowed some credentialed journalists to access the Pentagon, were unconstitutional.
The Times called the policy an unconstitutional attempt to prevent reporting on the Pentagon's affairs. "Americans deserve visibility into how their government is being run, and the actions the military is taking in their name and with their tax dollars," the Times said in a statement.
The new lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asks for the cancellation of components of the interim policy and its escort requirement, along with the reinstatement of access for Barnes and the Times' other journalists.
The policy "hurts the American people by trying to hide important information from them during wartime," added Theodore Boutrous, a partner at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher representing the Times, in a statement.
The Pentagon has said in-person access is "a privilege extended by the government," and that it needs to balance transparency with security concerns related to the unauthorized disclosure of sensitive information. It also has equated some forms of newsgathering with illegal solicitation.
The latest suit describes the department's "disdain for the Times" and other members of the Pentagon press corps. It points to one instance in which Parlatore compared reporters asking a department official unapproved questions to a murderer trying to hire a "hit man," the suit states, as well as Hegseth's comment calling the Times "unpatriotic."
The Times and Barnes first sued the Defense Department, Hegseth and Pentagon spokesman Parnell in December. In March, U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman ruled that key elements of the new press policy were unconstitutional, and that the Pentagon must restore the press credentials of certain reporters.
Days later the Pentagon updated its press rules, saying it would move all credentialed journalists to a workspace in an annex facility outside the Pentagon. The new rules created additional restrictions for all journalists, including those who had agreed to the department's policy last fall limiting communication with military officials.
Judge Friedman rejected the revised policy in a ruling last month.
The Pentagon appealed that ruling, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said it could temporarily require journalists to be escorted inside the Pentagon. That lawsuit remains in the appeals process.
Today, reporters must either forgo conversations in the building or spend hours chasing schedulers by phone and shuttling in and out of the building, according to the suit.
Limiting "meaningful" access to military officials is hurting the American public, the Times argues.
"This loss is made more urgent by recent events that have exacerbated the importance of independent reporting, including the capture of the President of Venezuela, the Iran war, and Secretary Hegseth's firings of multiple high-ranking military officials," the Times said.
Write to Alexandra Bruell at alexandra.bruell@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 18, 2026 14:26 ET (18:26 GMT)
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