Panelists on Washington Week With The Atlantic joined to discuss the meeting with U.S. generals, and new press access rules at the Pentagon.
Courtesy of Washington Week With The Atlantic
September 27, 2025, 10:17 AM ET
Editor’s Note: Washington Week With The Atlantic is a partnership between NewsHour Productions, WETA, and The Atlantic airing every Friday on PBS stations nationwide. Check your local listings, watch full episodes here, or listen to the weekly podcast here.
This week, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth summoned hundreds of U.S. military leaders to Washington. “It’s not clear what the purpose of this fairly unprecedented meeting is,” the editor in chief of The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, said last night on Washington Week With The Atlantic. Panelists joined him to discuss the meeting, as well as new press-access rules at the Pentagon.
To have hundreds of generals and admirals from all over the world in the same room, pulled off key battles and front lines, “poses a huge security risk,” Nancy Youssef, a staff writer at The Atlantic, said last night. “It’s reasonable to ask if it really stops there, or whether this is part of a broader effort to let them know the expectations of them going forward under this administration.”
Meanwhile, Hegseth has announced new restrictions that could limit journalists’ access to the Pentagon. “If journalists can’t ask questions—which is exactly what [the administration is] trying to get the Pentagon press corps to sign on and do—how are you ever to know what these kinds of massive unprecedented meetings are about?” Ali Vitali, the host of Way Too Early on MSNBC, asked last night.
Joining Goldberg to discuss this and more: Vitali; Stephen Hayes, the editor of The Dispatch; Karen Tumulty, a chief political correspondent at The Washington Post; and Nancy Youssef, a staff writer at The Atlantic.
Watch the full episode here.