Stars and Stripes Staffers’ Firing Paused Upon Court Request
By • August 31, 2026 0 355
In a dramatic turn of events, the Department of Defense capitulated to a temporary truce on Friday, staying its hand in the Aug. 21 termination of three top staffers at Stars and Stripes, a legislatively independent DOD newspaper and website that reports on matters concerning U.S. service members and their families. The news outlet is partly funded by American taxpayers.
By order of the high command, the three were placed upon the administrative shelf until Friday, Sept. 4, granting a one-week reprieve.
This halt allows the federal bench time to weigh a contested injunction in the journalists’ lawsuit for wrongful termination.
Star and Stripes reported on Aug. 28: “Erik Slavin, the editor in chief; Lara Korte, the paper’s Middle East reporter; and Max D. Lederer Jr., the publisher, filed the 45-page lawsuit the day prior against chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell, the Defense Department, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and another public affairs official, Andrew Brey.
“The lawsuit alleges their firings violated their right to free speech and were issued in retaliation for the news outlet’s unflattering coverage of conditions aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.”
In an Aug. 24 interview on CBS News’ “The Takeout with Major Garrett,” Slavin called the termination notice a “real shock” and a “very unexpected” development, as CBS reported.
The stated reason for his firing, Slavin told CBS, was his appearance last month in a “CBS Sunday Morning” report on the Trump administration’s push to overhaul Stars and Stripes. Slavin was asked if there were any lines that he would not cross, and he said a demand from the military not to publish a “perfectly accurate story” would be a “red line.”
Also on CBS News, Slavin called those comments a “hypothetical response, in my personal opinion, as to what would be my red line. And I described censorship, which I believe to be in line with Department of Defense regulations and the law itself.”
Slavin was an editorial contributor for The Georgetowner in the early 2000s before joining Stars and Stripes.
Founded during the Civil War, Stars and Stripes was revived World War I and is headquartered at the National Press Building on 14th Street.
