Pentagon Fires Stars and Stripes’ Advocate for Independence

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April 23, 2026, 10:38 p.m. ET

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Pentagon Fires Stars and Stripes’ Advocate for Independence

The newspaper’s ombudsman, Jacqueline Smith, said she had been given no reason for her dismissal.

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The Pentagon has been taking steps to increase its editorial control of Stars and Stripes, which has covered the military continuously since World War II.

Credit...

Valerie Plesch for The New York Times

By

Erik Wemple

April 23, 2026,

10:13 p.m. ET

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In a blow to independent coverage of the military, the Pentagon has fired the ombudsman for Stars and Stripes, a newspaper that covers the U.S. armed forces and is partly funded by the Defense Department.

“Apparently the Pentagon also doesn’t want you to hear from me anymore about threats to the editorial independence of Stars and Stripes,” the ombudsman, Jacqueline Smith, wrote

in a Stars and Stripes column

published on Thursday. She said that the Defense Department had given no reason for her dismissal and that she had been told it was “not grievable.”

Her role as ombudsman, which she began in December 2023, was to serve as a watchdog monitoring the paper’s independence and to report concerns to Congress.

“Jacqueline Smith has been relieved of her duties as Stars and Stripes ombudsman effective immediately,” the Defense Department said in a statement.

Ms. Smith’s departure followed months of actions by the Pentagon, under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth,

to exert editorial control

of the newspaper, which has been published continuously since World War II. On Jan. 15, Sean Parnell, the department’s chief spokesman, kicked off the intervention

with a social media post

: “We will modernize its operations, refocus its content away from woke distractions that syphon morale, and adapt it to serve a new generation of service members.”

That directive blindsided the editorial leadership at Stars and Stripes — just as Ms. Smith was unprepared for the notice that she was being removed from the payroll.

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