DoD Threatens Journalist to Keep Him Quiet… He Reveals EVERYTHING!

📰 Journalism Under Fire: How the Pentagon Tried to Silence a Security Story

The account of journalist Dan Friedlman’s investigation into senior Pentagon advisor Eric Garassy is a stark and alarming demonstration of two crises currently converging in the U.S. government: a crisis of national security vulnerability at the highest levels and a crisis of deliberate journalistic intimidation orchestrated by political allies. The original story about a Pentagon official’s questionable personal life quickly escalated into a more sinister narrative: the government actively attempting to weaponize propaganda against legitimate reporting.

The Original Investigation: Security, Not Salaciousness

Friedlman’s initial inquiry into Eric Garassy, a senior advisor to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, was rooted in legitimate national security concerns, not simply salacious gossip. The key issues Friedlman raised were:

Susceptibility to Foreign Influence: Former senior CIA officers confirm that for Pentagon personnel, romantic relationships with foreign partners are a major concern. Garassy’s past included living with a woman in 2016 who evidence suggests may have been a Chinese national. This woman registered a limited liability company referencing Chinese investment at his home address, which was later dissolved. Such relationships should, at a minimum, “draw scrutiny” during a security clearance assessment.

Vulnerability to Blackmail/Compromise: Garassy’s email addresses were linked to multiple data breaches, including the infamous Ashley Madison leak. This creates a clear point of potential leverage for foreign services looking to gain “any leverage against you.”

Questionable Online Activity: Friedlman discovered a public Goodreads page linked to Garassy’s email address, which featured explicit, pornographic works centered on “Asian wife sharing” and cuckold fantasies, alongside military histories and books by Hegseth. This page was taken down the day after Friedlman contacted the Pentagon.

The core of the initial story was clear: the public had a right to know if a high-ranking defense official’s personal life and online activities created a liability for military security.

The Intimidation Play: Coincidence or Coordination?

The story took a dramatic and immediate turn when Friedlman received a retaliatory email from political operative Jack Posobiec, a figure known for promoting the “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory. The timing, content, and identical deadline cited in Posobiec’s email were suspicious to the point of appearing deliberate:

Party
Action
Deadline
Implication

Dan Friedlman (Reporter)
Inquiry to Pentagon on Garassy’s relationships/online activity.
5:00 PM, Oct 29th
Standard journalistic protocol.

Jack Posobiec (MAGA Operative)
Email to Friedlman, making false claims about his “creepy fetish for Asian women” and asking about his marriage.
5:00 PM, Oct 29th
Direct, mirror-image smear campaign.

Despite denials from a Pentagon spokesperson and Posobiec himself, the conclusion was inescapable: this was a deliberate message—”Publish your article and get smeared.” This act of journalistic intimidation by an operative closely tied to the Defense Department effectively turned the story from an exposé about an official’s vulnerability into an exposé about the government’s attempts to silence the press.

The Institutional Attack on the Free Press

This attempted intimidation fits perfectly within the broader, ongoing attack on the press from this administration, particularly from the Pentagon under Pete Hegseth.

In October, the Pentagon imposed radical new journalistic rules that essentially prohibited reporters from publishing information not first approved by Hegseth. This was a naked effort to control the narrative and suppress any reporting that contradicted the administration’s propaganda.

The result was the mass expulsion of legitimate, credentialed reporters, leaving behind only a handful of individuals who functioned less as journalists and more as uncritical “Trump influencers.” Hegseth’s stated desire to “verify what was being reported before it was being reported” is a complete perversion of the function of a free press, which works on the principles of fact-checking and diligence before publication, not pre-publication government censorship.

Friedlman’s decision to publish the story, including the details of the intimidation, was a necessary act of journalistic fortitude. To have killed the story would have meant caving to bullying and appearing to validate the administration’s tactics. By publishing the whole truth, the reporter transformed a story about security concerns into a powerful demonstration of how government officials, in a blatant effort to protect the politically connected, will actively deploy smear campaigns to quash legitimate reporting.

This entire incident serves as a vital reminder that press freedom is not a courtesy, but a constant, necessary battle against those who confuse censorship with security.