Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth escalated his attacks on the media Thursday, comparing reporters covering the Iran war to the Pharisees, the biblical Jewish group that opposed Jesus.
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The comments came at a Pentagon press briefing in which Hegseth first described the American media as “incredibly unpatriotic.”
“I just can’t help but notice the endless stream of garbage, the relentlessly negative coverage you cannot resist peddling, despite the historic and important success of this effort and the success of our troops,” Hegseth said, referring to the Iran war.
“Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what side some of you are actually on,” he added.
Since the fighting began in late February, Hegseth, who is Christian, has frequently used religious rhetoric at news conferences and attacked the media over its coverage. But he went further Thursday by doing so with religious overtones.
Hegseth said he was at church on Sunday when his pastor read a Bible passage that described Jesus healing a man in front of the Pharisees, “the so-called and self-appointed elites of their time.”
“Our press are just like these Pharisees — not all of you, not all of you, but the legacy Trump-hating press. Your politically motivated animus for President Trump nearly completely blinds you from the brilliance of our American warriors,” he said.
Hegseth added: “The Pharisees scrutinized every good act in order to find a violation, only looking for the negative. The hardened hearts of our press are calibrated only to impugn. I would ask you to open your eyes to the goodness, the historic success of our troops, the courage of this president.”
Hegseth was a member of the media — a Fox News host — before President Donald Trump tapped him to lead the Defense Department. Like some other members of the Trump administration, his use of Christian rhetoric in public statements is a departure from the language used by his predecessors.
Bill Grueskin, a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, said Hegseth’s latest attacks on the press revealed a misunderstanding of the role of the media in the U.S.
“It’s no surprise that a Fox News host who has done so little actual reporting in his career would fail to understand how journalists do their jobs,” Grueskin said. “But Hegseth gives it away when he says, ‘Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what side some of you are actually on.’”
“Ideally, reporters are on the side of the truth and see their role as providing the most accurate, complete and transparent account of what’s happening on the ground,” added Grueskin, a former senior editor at the Miami Herald, Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News. “That is especially difficult given that Hegseth himself has limited journalists’ access at the Pentagon and that it’s almost impossible for U.S. reporters to work inside Iran’s borders.”
Gretchen Carlson, a former Fox News anchor, also criticized Hegseth’s remarks.
“As a Christian how dare you use religion to shame those who simply ask questions,” she wrote on X.
The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
