Stars and Stripes in Peril

Summary

On the Media – Stars and Stripes in Peril

Date: January 28, 2026
Hosts: Brooke Gladstone
Guest: Eric Slavin, Editor in Chief of Stars and Stripes

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Episode Overview

This episode investigates looming threats to the editorial independence of Stars and Stripes, the century-old newspaper serving the US armed forces. Host Brooke Gladstone interviews Eric Slavin, Editor in Chief, to discuss rumored Defense Department plans under Secretary Pete Hegseth to reshape the paper. The conversation offers historical context, details current challenges, critiques new Pentagon messaging, and addresses implications for military journalism, morale, and democracy.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Pentagon Pressure and Proposed Changes

• Background: Sean Parnell, Pentagon spokesperson, recently announced via X (formerly Twitter) that Stars and Stripes would cease carrying Associated Press (AP) wire reports and would focus more narrowly on “weapons systems, fitness, lethality, survivability”—eliminating content purportedly considered “woke” or detrimental to morale. [00:57]
• Slavin’s Perspective:
  • The staff was blindsided: “This was a complete surprise to us.” (Eric Slavin, [01:55])
  • No direct Defense Department communication so far, just online posts.
  • Concerns about losing AP/wire content, which fills coverage gaps and serves isolated service members. [02:30]
• PR vs. Journalism: Reports (e.g., Daily Wire) suggest future content may come 50% from the War Department and be written by active servicemembers, blurring lines between PR and independent reporting.

  “If you were to mingle PR with independent journalism, where it is indistinguishable, then that erodes credibility and [the] fundamental mission of providing service members with independent news.” (Eric Slavin, [03:37])

2. The Meaning of “Woke Distractions”

• Criticism of Pentagon Framing: Gladstone presses Slavin on what “woke distractions that siphon morale” really means. [04:09]
• Slavin’s Response:
  • True morale comes from reflecting service members’ lived experiences and concerns.

  “I think you have a deeper morale when what you are…posting corresponds with the lived experiences of your readers...I think that improves morale rather than just attempting to cheerlead.” (Eric Slavin, [04:53])

• Examples of “Morale-Sapping” Coverage: Reporting on housing costs, food insecurity, school issues, and sexual assault investigations—stories no one else covers in depth for the military community.

3. Legal Protections and Regulatory Changes

• Historical Safeguards: Stars and Stripes operated under the Code of Federal Regulations, mandating objectivity, credibility, and editorial independence from DoD interference. [05:28]
• Recent Developments: This Code was quietly removed, with the DoD terming it “unnecessary,” raising fears about future vulnerabilities.
  • The only current protection is an older 1994 directive, but DoD rules can be changed internally.

  “That Code of Federal Regulations was a greater backstop...That was rescinded without any notification.” (Eric Slavin, [07:06])

• FOIA Issues: The Pentagon sometimes blocks Stars and Stripes reporters from filing FOIA requests, claiming their federal organization status—a stance Slavin disputes. [06:24]

4. Stars and Stripes’ Mission, Impact, and Unique Coverage

• Historic Role: Founded during the Civil War, revived for each major conflict, and continuously printed since 1942. [07:55]
• Reporting Examples:
  • Exposed double-taxation issues for military families in Germany, resulting in policy change. [08:43]
  • In-depth coverage of obscure but crucial topics, from girls’ high school basketball to trash collection information in small German towns (“K Town Now” blog). [09:40]
  • Investigated poor healthcare access for Defense Department employees in Japan, triggering attention from officials. [10:00]
• Effect on Readers:

  “We speak German so they don’t have to.” (Eric Slavin, [09:55])

  • The paper uniquely addresses gaps faced by overseas service members and their families.

5. Past and Present Political Interference

• Not the First Threat: Recall of 2020’s attempted defunding (under different administration), reversed only after intervention by Congress, military leaders, and the President. [10:51]

  “A number of people among the general public, some former generals and admirals, came out and said that they didn’t necessarily agree with everything we ran, but thought that we were important to have.” (Eric Slavin, [11:19])

• Pressures have increased recently, with the Pentagon demanding mainstream reporters sign restrictive pledges, leading to a walkout and their replacement by partisan figures. [16:25]

6. Investigative Highlights and Reader Impact

• Investigative Stories:
  • The tragic death of sailor Dee Spearman ([12:04])—reporter’s persistence led to recognition of systemic safety failures.
  • Exposed errors in FBI criminal databases that marked service members as felons simply for being questioned, not convicted ([13:15]).

  “Suddenly someone would tell them, you have a criminal record... when in effect, they had never even been arrested.” (Eric Slavin, [13:40])

• Relationship with Audience:
  • Audience expects accuracy, depth, and advocacy. [14:57]
  • Staff often act as intermediaries, helping resolve issues even before stories are fully reported.

  “We’ll ask, have you gone through your chain of command?... sometimes it gets cleared up just after we’ve made a phone call.” (Eric Slavin, [14:57])

7. The Challenge of Remaining Independent Amid Changing Winds

• Morale, Censorship, and Self-Censorship:
  • Gladstone underscores the harm of censorship in the name of “morale”:

    “People would rather be seen than to be fed a line of what they know is bs.” (Brooke Gladstone, [15:42])

• Slavin’s Commitment:

  “Everything we do is for the service member. We try to give them well-rounded news so that they can participate as citizens in a democracy... That’s what we're going to keep trying to do as long as we possibly can.” (Eric Slavin, [17:45])

8. Lack of Direct Orders—Yet

• So far, only social media posts announce changes; no direct guidance from the DoD received as of recording. [18:39]

  “We are going to keep on keeping on because we have no real alternative.” (Eric Slavin, [18:39])

• Slavin hopes for dialogue, but remains wary:

  “If they do come through with some instructions... hopefully we can sit down and have a conversation that is not on social media and we can work out whatever differences we might have and preserve Stars and Stripes as an independent news organization.” ([18:56])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “If you were to mingle PR with independent journalism... that erodes credibility and [the] fundamental mission.”
  – Eric Slavin ([03:37])
• “That Code of Federal Regulations was a greater backstop to support the independence of the organization. That was rescinded without any notification.”
  – Eric Slavin ([07:06])
• “We speak German so they don’t have to.” – Eric Slavin ([09:55])
• “People would rather be seen than to be fed a line of what they know is bs.”
  – Brooke Gladstone ([15:42])
• “Everything we do is for the service member... That’s what we're going to keep trying to do as long as we possibly can.”
  – Eric Slavin ([17:45])

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Important Timestamps

• [00:57] – Introduction and overview of the Pentagon’s proposed changes to Stars and Stripes
• [01:55] – Eric Slavin describes shock at the Pentagon’s announcement
• [02:30] – Discussion of wire services, “AP reprints,” and the paper’s role for remote service members
• [03:37] – The threat of blending PR with journalism
• [04:53] – Slavin explains why reporting on real problems boosts morale
• [05:28] – Loss of legal protections for editorial independence
• [07:55] – Historical overview of Stars and Stripes
• [08:43] – Notable investigative and local impact reporting
• [12:04] – Dee Spearman’s story and the importance of investigative persistence
• [13:15] – FBI database reporting mistake affecting veterans
• [14:57] – The paper’s unique relationship with its audience
• [16:25] – Recent Pentagon crackdowns on the press; press badge controversy
• [17:45] – Mission statement reaffirmed
• [18:39] – No new instructions yet; future uncertain but work continues

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Episode Takeaways

• Stars and Stripes’ independence is under threat from proposed Pentagon interventions that could undermine its editorial mission and blend government PR with journalism.
• Legal protections for independence have been quietly eroded, highlighting the paper’s precarious position.
• The publication distinguishes itself by its granular, locally-relevant—and sometimes uncomfortable—reporting that directly affects the lives and morale of its military audience.
• Slavin and his team resolve to continue their mission despite uncertainty, emphasizing the importance of transparency, honesty, and democracy for their readership and the wider public.

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For listeners and non-listeners alike, this episode shines a light on the vital role of independent military journalism and the ever-present tensions with government interests.

Transcript

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[Brooke Gladstone]

Is the Omnimedia Midweek Pod. I'm Brooke Gladstone Stars and Stripes, the venerated, independent, award winning newspaper that has served the armed services for roughly a century, may be getting an uninvited makeover courtesy of Pete Hegseth's Defense Department. In a statement posted on X earlier this month, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said that Stars and Stripes would no longer be carrying wire reports from these stars studiously impartial ap, and that it would steer away from all that is woke or might SAP morale. Parnell said the Defense Department would be bringing the newspaper, quote, into the 21st century. It may happen. So far there have only been the posts and one anonymous report. But as someone who's been hosting this show for that entire century, I can only testify that it hasn't been the best for journalism.

[Eric Slavin]

This was a complete surprise to us.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Eric Slavin is the editor in chief of Stars and Stripes.

[Eric Slavin]

To this point, we still have not spoken directly with the Pentagon, although we would certainly welcome a chance to sit down and discuss what we do, parnell wrote.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Quote, stars and Stripes will be custom tailored to our war fighters. It will focus on weapons systems, fitness, lethality, survivability. No more repurposed D.C. gossip columns. No or Associated Press reprints. How do you envision that change?

[Eric Slavin]

It's difficult to say exactly what they're referring to. No other news organization that I'm aware of is on the ground in a lot of remote bases throughout Europe and the Pacific providing really granular military news. We have used wire stories to round that coverage out because we can't be everywhere at once. And we think that, for example, a soldier who's out in a very remote area in the desert might want to know what happened with the NFL. The wire service does that. And also with a number of stories that we don't have the bandwidth to produce. But in terms of our overall military coverage, I mean, it is very, very focused on the military community, on families.

[Brooke Gladstone]

There was a story in the Daily Wire in which anonymous War Department officials said that Stars and Stripes stories would be written by active duty service members and, quote, 50% of the website's content would be composed of War Department generated materials. Now, to me, that sounds like pr. What does it sound like to you?

[Eric Slavin]

Well, we've had civilian staff since the 40s. We do have primarily civilian reporters, but we also do take on military reporters, somewhat like interns in those civilian reporters, take them under the wing and show them how to be journalists. As for the rest of that Daily Wire story, if you were to mingle PR with independent journalism, where it is indistinguishable, then that erodes credibility and fundamental mission of providing service members with independent news.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Which brings me to Parnell's statement targeting, quote, woke distractions that siphon mor now, a vital part, as you said of Stars and Stripes mission is covering things like the high cost of off base housing or the plight of military families who need food stamps, or struggling with schoolbook removals or investigations into sexual assault cases within the military. I mean, that's the stuff you cover in a granular way. Your readers are not going to find any anywhere else. What does woke distractions that siphon morale mean to you?

[Eric Slavin]

I think you have a deeper morale when what you are printing, what you are posting corresponds with the lived experiences of your readers. If they are looking around and seeing issues that need to be resolved and you report on them, that feels like their issues and what they're thinking about has been acknowledged. And I think that improves morale rather than just attempting to cheerlead.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Right.

[Eric Slavin]

And there may be a place for that, but we think we can do more in reading the comments of service members who come to us and thank us for what we do. I think that's validated.

[Brooke Gladstone]

You have had something called the Code of Federal Regulations, which states that reporters must produce work that is, quote, objective, credible and editorially independent of the military chain of command and military public affairs activities. That has recently been removed by the Defense Department on the basis that it is, quote, unnecessary, which leaves the paper operating, I guess, under an older Department of Defense directive from back in 1994. Why would they remove the Code of Federal Regulations?

[Eric Slavin]

This Code of Federal Regulations was being modernized last Year there was public comment. They were overwhelmingly supportive of the independent mission. And actually, many of them called for the expansion of that mission.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Being more independent, you mean. In what way or how?

[Eric Slavin]

The Defense Department has attempted to deny us the right to file under the Freedom of Information act, which just about anyone on Earth can do. But they have said that we are a federal organization and cannot do that. We have argued against that. We have found alternate ways to make those FOIAs in some places, but oftentimes they flat out have rejected that. At the moment, there is a Department of Defense regulation still in effect which says that Stars and Stripes cannot be subject to news management or censorship by military or government officials. So that is still in place.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Then they can't be supplying 50% of its content directly from the Pentagon.

[Eric Slavin]

That is true, but that is also a Department of Defense regulation. And the Department of Defense can change its own regulations. So that Code of Federal regulations was a greater backstop to support the independence of the organization. That was rescinded without any notification.

[Brooke Gladstone]

So a little history. In the midst of the Civil War, Stars and Stripes was started by some Union soldiers who'd captured an area that included a printing press. They went ahead and made their own paper. This, of course, during a war is so fraught that the Lincoln administration suppressed some 300 newspapers critical of the war. Then after the war, Stars and Stripes went dark for a while, I think. Can you pick it up from there?

[Eric Slavin]

Sure. It reappeared in World War I. The first copy that I've seen from World War I had a big picture of Pershing. It was under President Wilson. And then it went dark again, as you said. But it has been continuously printed since 1942 in Europe, again from multiple locations as Allied forces gained ground and printed in 1945, beginning in Asia. And from there it's been printed continuously in multiple countries throughout the world. It has always had some measure of independence. There have been trouble at various times and attempts to impose censorship. But General Eisenhower was very forthright during World War II, said, this is the soldier's paper and it should not be censored.

[Brooke Gladstone]

And the focus is on the soldiers and their families.

[Eric Slavin]

We looked at the number of families that were on food stamps overseas, and then we found at least 7,000. We looked at the obstacles to spouse hiring. Military spouses are, on balance, overeducated and underemployed. If they. They were able to find a job. And there are structural impediments to that. A lot of the rules were written in 1951. There were service members who were being double taxed. A small part of Germany decided that if they thought that U.S. service members and other DoD employees were planning on staying in Germany, they subjected them to income tax, even if they had paid US Income tax. And in some cases they imposed penalties of 100 to $200,000. We wrote about that. Germany stopped doing that. We cover the schools overseas. We will cover even the sports overseas. I don't know too many publications that are interested in covering a girls basketball team between two schools who have about 150 people. But we will do that. We have kind of a blog like function called K Town now for about 50,000 people who live in Germany where we will tell them even the smallest details about trash pickup in town. We speak German so they don't have to. As far as the bigger stories, there was one where there are thousands of people who work for the Defense Department in Japan. They weren't always getting the health care that they needed. And we reported on that and that got some attention. I think service members understand that if there is an issue overseas that no one else is well placed to report upon, we're there. And that I think is a boon to their morale.

[Brooke Gladstone]

You say that this came as a complete surprise, but did you get any pushback this past year with the Defense Department under Pete Hegseth? Surely, given the coverage you've done. I mean, we cited your coverage of service people being harried by ICE and even detained. You didn't hear anything?

[Eric Slavin]

No. It is not a new thing for Stars and Stripes to come under fire. That happened in 2020. The Secretary of Defense announced that they were going to cease funding for Stars and Stripes.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Why?

[Eric Slavin]

The answer they gave in a press conference is that it did not fit their conception of putting out their message, which is not what Stars and Stripes is for anyway. And a number of people in Congress had a problem with that. A number of people among the general public, some former generals and admirals, came out and said that they didn't necessarily agree with everything we ran, but thought that we were important to have ultimately between Congress and even the President who tweeted out, we are going to keep Stars and Stripes, we continued to survive. So the idea that someone would decide to make changes or otherwise target our independence, it's not a new idea. But again, we were not anticipating this.

[Brooke Gladstone]

We talked about some of the examples of the paper's noteworthy work, but I wonder if you could just pick out past and present some stories that really stand out for you.

[Eric Slavin]

Dee Spearman is somebody that I will always Remember, he was a very young sailor who was aboard the USS Arleigh Burke, 2022, I believe, and he fell overboard and he died. At the time, there was a very short release regarding his death. Our reporter stuck with this for two years. She continued to ask for documentation, even when documentation wasn't coming very quickly. She did the interviews, she talked to the family members. Ultimately, what we found in some of the Navy's reports and from accounts from people aboard the ship was that Dee had fainted at least four times aboard the ship, twice when he was helming the ship, but he was sent to work alone on the top deck of the ship. There were improper lifelines. Just a number of issues related to that that really made you question, okay, was proper procedure followed and did he have to die from that reporting? I would hope that the Navy may have learned something about how to handle these types of situations. And I think the family gained at least a little bit of closure knowing that their son's story was of kind.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Is there another investigative piece you'd want to point to?

[Eric Slavin]

We found out that service members, if they were questioned for a felony, it was being recorded in an FBI database as being convicted of a felony that was being forwarded to the FBI. And it ended up being recorded as if they had actually committed crimes. And so service members, when they got out and they were looking for jobs, suddenly someone would tell them, you have a criminal record.

[Brooke Gladstone]

How did that happen?

[Eric Slavin]

Under the ucmj, which is the Uniform Code of Military justice, you would have investigators who would document that they had spoken to these people and that was getting forwarded to the FBI, appearing as if they had been convicted of something when in effect, they had never even been arrested.

[Brooke Gladstone]

They're getting their records expunged.

[Eric Slavin]

Well, they're trying to.

[Brooke Gladstone]

You said that you've sent reporters into harm's way and that this isn't a regular journalism job. You've lived through it yourself. You were a reporter for the publication for many years, covering the military from Iraq, Japan, South Korea. So what makes this job unique now?

[Eric Slavin]

They are not doing the push ups. They're not going through a lot of the stresses that active duty service members are, and we would never claim to do that. But moving every few years, issues at finance, moving to a new country, figuring out the paperwork that needs to be done. On the Defense Department side, the reporters really live a lifestyle which is very similar to that of their readers.

[Brooke Gladstone]

What do they say about your reporting? What are they usually getting in touch with you about?

[Eric Slavin]

Their questions, I think, are more granular they expect you to know what they're talking about and speak in very professional terms. And if you're wrong, they will call you out on it very quickly. So it really behooves us to have our stuff straight. You do also have a lot of people reach out when they feel like the bureaucracy is failing them. We will talk to them. We'll ask, have you gone through your chain of command? What have you tried to do about a particular problem? And sometimes we will make that phone call and ask a command, say, hey, what's going on here? Why does this sailor have mold in his room? And before you even have the chance to write the story, sometimes it gets cleared up just after we've made a phone call.

[Brooke Gladstone]

But if you're not allowed to report on anything that saps morale, as you say, people would rather be seen than to be fed a line of what they know is bs. The world that they live in should be reflected to some degree in the paper that they read. Is that something the Pentagon doesn't seem to understand?

[Eric Slavin]

Well, we have published stories of people doing very heroic things as well. I mean, the other day we had a story about some marines in a ramen shop in Okinawa who saved somebody from choking. But sometimes things are not perfect, and service members are aware of that. And so we report it when it's news.

[Brooke Gladstone]

You know, over the last year, we've seen the Pentagon bearing down pretty hard on the press. Hegseth demanded that reporters sign a pledge promising to never divulge or gather information that the Pentagon hasn't authorized for release. That includes unclassified information or else they would have to turn in their badges. And the Pentagon press corps, pretty much as a body, did just that. They walked out and they were replaced by lackeys, funders like mypillowman. Right wing influencers like Laura Loomer. X, of course, is there in full force. Is reining in Stars and Stripes just another attempt to control the narrative, most particularly for people into the armed services? What do you think they're trying to do?

[Eric Slavin]

I would love to know what they're trying to do. I really would, Brooke. I would love to sit down with them and have a discussion about what it is they want. I'm happy to talk about our mission, talk about the things that we do for our readers and for the military community.

[Brooke Gladstone]

I know, but I just think that the people making these decisions, what they think of the audience, that they want to tailor the stars and stripes to tailor made, as they said.

[Eric Slavin]

Yeah, I guess that tweet enumerates some of the things that they consider important. And a lot of those things are subjects that we do cover. We just cover more than that. I don't know what we are doing that they disagree with because they haven't told us. But everything we do is for the service member. We try to give them well rounded news so that they can participate as citizens in a democracy while also explaining to them what the US Armed Forces are doing and why they are where they are. That's what we do and that's what we're going to keep trying to do as long as we possibly can.

[Brooke Gladstone]

So aside from this tweet and subsequent tweets, there haven't been any instructions that have come down to you. Do you have something to respond to or are you just going to keep on keeping on?

[Eric Slavin]

We are going to keep on keeping on because we have no real alternative. There's no message that has come to us beyond a social media post.

[Brooke Gladstone]

That's it.

[Eric Slavin]

That's it.

[Brooke Gladstone]

What happens if they do come through with some instructions?

[Eric Slavin]

Obviously we're concerned about what might come given what we've seen, but we will attempt to explain what it is we do and why we do it. Hopefully we can sit down and have a conversation that is not on social media and we can work out whatever differences we might have and we can preserve Stars and Stripes as an independent news organization.

[Brooke Gladstone]

So this could just be something they ran up the flagpole. It might not even be real.

[Eric Slavin]

The post was real, we know that. But as to what they want to do beyond that post, I don't know how much credence to give. What I've read in other news sources by anonymous sources, and I don't have any real details as to what it is they want to accomplish.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Eric, thank you very much.

[Eric Slavin]

Thank you.

[Brooke Gladstone]

Eric Slavin is the Editor in Chief of Stars and Stripes. Thanks for listening to the midweek podcast. The Big show posts as it usually does on Friday, roughly around dinner time. See you then, I hope.

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