NewsNovo
A court has ruled that the Pentagon maintains the authority to terminate journalists employed by Stars and Stripes.
The institutional one, whether a news organization whose staff can be dismissed by the Defense Department can credibly cover it, is not. The word "maintains" carries weight here.
It signals that the Pentagon's termination authority was contested before the court affirmed it. The ruling does not create a new power for the Defense Department. It upholds one that was apparently in dispute.
That distinction is worth holding: the outcome is a status quo preserved, not expanded. Stars and Stripes employs journalists, and the court has now confirmed that the Pentagon holds the authority to end those jobs.
Keep reading