Stars and Stripes Publisher Quits Over Pentagon Control
Get the Geopolitics newsletter
Daily geopolitics — wars, elections, sanctions, the diplomatic moves that move markets. Free.
- Max D Lederer Jr announced his retirement as Stars and Stripes publisher effective September 30, ending a 19-year tenure, after writing in his memo that his editorial philosophy "differ[s] in fundamental ways" from Pentagon leadership's direction for the organization.
- Lederer's resignation comes shortly after Stars and Stripes broke the story of a mental health crisis aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, where a sailor's wife reported her husband attempted to jump overboard amid "severe burnout" during a near-record nine-month deployment.
- Senator Richard Blumenthal wrote to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that the USS Abraham Lincoln has been continuously at sea for nearly seven months without a port stop — surpassing any previous US carrier deployment — with more than 5,000 crew aboard, and that conditions include broken toilets, food shortages, and deteriorating mental health.
- Admiral Brad Cooper, who visited the carrier last week, countered that of the Navy's 11 active aircraft carriers, the Lincoln "currently has among the lowest number of cases related to mental health."
- Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and the Pentagon have accused Stars and Stripes of promoting "woke distractions"; in January, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said the department would "refocus its content away from woke distractions that syphon morale."
- The Pentagon funds about two-thirds of Stars and Stripes' budget and in April fired independent reader representative Jacqueline Smith shortly after she publicly warned of "attempted control" over the newsroom.
- Donald Trump himself reversed a first-term Pentagon attempt to defund Stars and Stripes in September 2020, writing on X that the US "will NOT be cutting funding" — a position his second-term Pentagon is now effectively eroding through editorial pressure.
Why it matters: The Pentagon funds two-thirds of Stars and Stripes and already fired the paper's independent reader representative in April. With Lederer's 19-year exit coming weeks after Stars and Stripes broke the USS Abraham Lincoln mental health story, editorial independence for the military's daily paper now depends on a Pentagon actively pushing for tighter newsroom control over coverage of troop conditions.
Ask SkimNews
