Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth faced backlash after his security clashed with reporters, threatening to physically remove them from his first Pentagon briefing in six months if they “do something silly.”
A security agent delivered the warning Tuesday morning before Hegseth took the podium, Washington Post reporter Tara Copp wrote on X. She called it “the first time any of us could ever remember being threatened like this.”
The briefing came as the House was set to take its first action that day on a resolution to impeach Hegseth, Punchbowl News defense reporter Briana Reilly wrote on X.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who filed the resolution, would need only three Republican votes if every Democrat backs it, ABC News reported. Democrats take control of Congress in January after their midterm sweep, and Republicans have only weeks left in the majority.
The warning came a day after Massie filed the resolution.
An official told reporters that anyone who “gets out of line” would be “removed physically,” Vanity Fair’s Aidan McLaughlin wrote on X.
When reporters shouted back to ask what that meant, the official said it meant keeping “decorum” and added that he was just relaying orders, McLaughlin wrote.
Blaze News correspondent Benjamin Roberts wrote on X that officials warned reporters they would be removed if they “do something silly,” prompting what he called “an extended back-and-forth between some reporters and staff.” Epoch Times reporter Ryan Morgan also wrote on X that reporters were “questioning this unusual warning.”
The pushback crossed ideological lines, coming from reporters at conservative outlets as well as mainstream ones.
“This isn’t the Hill where anyone can wander in,” Washington Times Pentagon reporter Mike Glenn wrote on X. “We basically get a colonoscopy to get in here.”
“We asked if that meant no shouted questions and got no clarity,” Copp wrote. “Shouted questions are normal.”
“This is crazy town,” one journalist said, according to Copp. The journalist noted that the White House has never threatened reporters like that.
Daily Wire White House correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan wrote that security had clarified “aggressive questions do not count,” Mediaite reported.
Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Joel Valdez then came out to explain the rules, but only “on the condition that his comments be off the record,” Reilly wrote later.
“When reporters refused to agree to that condition, he left,” she added.
After the warning, Hegseth ignored questions shouted by NBC and other established news organizations and took questions only from reporters at pro-Trump outlets such as One America News, Real America’s Voice and The Daily Wire, CNN reported.
The network said he was “perhaps seeking relatively easy questions about the war in Iran.” The network said he was “perhaps seeking relatively easy questions about the war in Iran.”
“Hegseth is a coward who is afraid to take questions from real reporters,” MeidasTouch editor-in-chief Ron Filipkowski wrote on X.
Moments after the briefing ended, President Donald Trump, who has said he’ll stand by Hegseth even if he’s impeached, wrote on social media that Hegseth “gets an ‘A’ PLUS, PLUS, PLUS,” CNN reported.