Tom Bowman Transcript — Dec. 5, 2025

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:00:00):

I can’t thank Tom Bowman enough for coming to us on short notice. His notice was last night, and he’s covering a beat as a couple of your colleagues here are covering. That is right now one of the most demanding or probably the most demanding beat in dc. And trying to get at the truth is even more challenging since the Press Corps was booted from the Pentagon a month ago. Where Almost two months

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:00:39):

Now.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:00:39):

Two months,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:00:41):

Yeah.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:00:41):

Well first, a little bit about Tom Few know the Pentagon better than Tom and the art of making difficult reporting more accessible for National Public Radio. During his nearly 20 years at NPR, Tom has traveled to Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, often for months at a time before landing. At NPR, Tom spent nearly two decades at the Baltimore Sun where he covered the Pentagon, Maryland State House Congress, the US Naval Academy, the National Security Agency, where his reporting on racial and gender discrimination at the NSA led to a 1994 government investigation. Tom is a co-winner of the 2006 National Headliners Award for his reports on the lack of advanced tourniquets for US troops in Iraq. And in 2010, his coverage of a Taliban attack on an Army unit won an Edward Arm Borough Award. So please welcome Tom and my interest in Tom being here today is quite obvious. The Pentagon is in meltdown on a number of fronts, but I’ve also been struck by the fact that a lot of what we know about the Pentagon has been uncovered after the press score was booted from the Pentagon. So I wanted to talk with him a little bit or have him talk with you a little bit about that challenge and how reporters are working to overcome that isolation and lack of immediate access and how you can apply that to your own work going forward. So Tom, I’ll turn it over to you.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:02:50):

Yeah. So we were kicked out of the Pentagon two months ago. I’m sure many realized that we were supposed to sign this new directive that basically said you can’t solicit information from anyone at the Pentagon. You have to wait until they release information, then you can report on it. And I was at a reception about a month ago. It was Romanian Armed Forces Day, which we all know is our October 25th, and it was at the Army Navy Club and there was a sea of military attache from all over the world, Latvia, Uganda, Canada, Japan. And this guy walks up and introduces himself. He was military at attache from China, perfect English, second time, second tour in the United States. So we were talking, where have you been? How many states? He said, I’ve been to 35 states. I said, what are your favorite places? He said, I love Boston, and I’m from the Boston area. And he said, I’ve also been to Cape Cod where my dad grew up. And I said, you’re my kind of guy, so we’re just chatting and everything else. And he said, so tell me about this Pentagon Press policy. I said, well, basically we have to wait until they give us information. We can’t reach out to anybody in the Pentagon and ask ’em what’s going on behind the scenes. So we have to wait until they release something and then we can report on that. He said, oh, kind of like us.

(00:04:20):

So it’s more challenging now at the Pentagon. We can’t go to the building. We’ll leave that up to Laura Loomer and the other people who are now at the Pentagon briefings. So it is a challenge. You have to, we know a lot of people still at the Pentagon, of course, and a lot of time overseas. The people I know I spent time with, and I’m still in touch with people I met in 2009, so that’s very helpful. The challenge is during the workday, trying to call them on the phone at the Pentagon. Everyone else is trying to call ’em too. So that can be a challenge.

(00:05:00):

So the workarounds are coffee and beer. We’ll meet after work outside of the Pentagon. You also want to keep in touch more. So I think now with Capitol Hill, reaching out to people up there, particularly staff members, I think a lot of times people are really enamored with getting an interview with the congressmen. And a lot of times it’s the staff that know more than the congressman and that we fall into that problem as well. Frankly, we have to get Congressman so and so on. I would rather talk to his top a committee aid. Sometimes they’ve been there longer than the congressman, so keep that in mind when you’re reporting. I would take one staffer sometimes over five members of Congress because they’re spread thin. They can’t devote all their time to a topic that you might be interested in. Number one, retired community. You have to reach out to the retired community as well.

(00:06:01):

And again, a lot of the people I’ve known over the years spent a lot of time with. They’re now retired, but they all keep in touch with their friends, whether you’re a state Department, whether you’re in the military or HHS or whatever, they know each other. It’s a very small community. And lastly, the embassies, like the Romanian Embassy, this guy invited me to this Romanian Armed Forces Day. I’m in much more touch now with the embassies than ever before, and I’m going to a briefing next week at one of the embassies. So they get a lot of information, obviously from the US government, or they’ll ask us, what’s going on? What are we hearing? So the bizarre is open, we can share information, what we’re hearing. And then also the think tanks are pretty good. Keep in touch with them, not only to go to an event, but who shows up at those events.

(00:06:54):

Sometimes that’s key. It could be a staff member from Congress, it could be some retired admiral or general that you want to keep in touch with. So scour the room and try to figure out who’s there and who you want to talk with. So that’s our new reality I guess in Washington, is try to figure out how do we move in this new environment where they’ve shut us out of the Pentagon. And I got to tell you, even if we’re going to the Pentagon, they’re not holding briefings. Anyway, hegseth had two briefings in the nine months we were there at the Pentagon.

(00:07:35):

And the funny thing was the protocol is always calling the wires first, always calling the ap. So I’m sitting there at his first briefing in the front row, gone off to the side, kind of looking around, waiting for the AP to get question. And he points at me and I’m like, I don’t think he knows who I work for, number one. And the other thing is the protocol is ap. He called on me twice. There were two briefings that he calls on me, which I thought was weird. I think part of it, because I’m a guy, right? He’s not going to call on a woman. I think that’s a big part of it. He didn’t answer the questions. And frankly, the second briefing was more a harangue at the press. If you go back and look at the video of that, he’s haranguing the Fox News reporter at the Pentagon, which was just bizarre. So again, even if we were allowed in the building now, it would be easy to go up to the desk offices and talk with them or run into someone in the hallway, but they’re not having briefings anyway. And the briefing they did have, if you’ve seen that, if you haven’t, go back and look at that briefing they just had, I can’t wait for SNL to do something. You have to think that tomorrow night they’re going to do something on it, because it was just bizarre.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:08:48):

Before I open it up to you all, I just wanted to ask, because the culture of the place has been changed so dramatically, at least on the surface, how has that affected or has it affected the long-term relationships that you’ve established over the time that you’ve indel can have long term? Speaking of long-term, wow. Yeah. Pete Meg said, you got to buy something now. Yeah. Wow. So how has that affected long-term relationships, especially infidelity, but has that chilled the group that you,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:09:32):

In some respects, it has. There’s an army general who works in one of the commands who I’ve known. I met him maybe 12 years ago in Afghanistan, and I’ve had beers with this guy. When he comes up to Washington now, he’s just ghosting me. And then we did this big piece on Gaza, asking ourselves, how do we get to a famine? How did this happen? And I worked on it with a couple of other reporters, and of course it happened October 7th, the Hama attack on Israel, and then they shut everything down. So what was going on behind the scenes in the Biden administration? So we started talking to people we knew, and then it just snowballed from there. And then someone said, we have to call so-and-so who’s this retired general I’ve known for years, and I didn’t realize he was involved in the humanitarian efforts briefing. The president on this route has to be opened to get into Gaza, blah, blah, blah, number of trucks. So I call him up and I said, damn, I haven’t talked to you in a long time. I said, come on open NPR. We’re doing this story in Gaza. I want to pick your brain. He said, Tom, there’s no way I’m going into NPR. Somebody may see me.

(00:10:48):

He is retired. So he had to meet at my house in Alexandria around my dining room table, a retired guy. There’s no questions, a chilling effect. But again, some people are still talking with us and we just have to hustle more. I think that’s the key. The other thing too is when we were covering Rumsfeld, who could be a real hard ass, of course, really pull out of pressure on leaks and don’t talk to the press, it has to come through me. And I found that particularly with the run up to Iraq, that more and more people were popping up as sources. And I think we’re seeing that now. Right. And you saw it with Tom Homan. Remember that bag of $50,000? Where do you think that came from?

(00:11:40):

Probably an FBI guy that was fired. Right? So whoever you are when you try to put a lid on, people don’t talk. And what we’ve seen with firing people at the Pentagon, cq Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Frank Ketty fired. What ripple effect do you think that has on the force and how pissed off do you think people are? Therefore, they rise up. But we’re seeing that repeatedly now. All these stories come out in the post and the times people are helping us a lot of times wouldn’t have in the past. I think we’ll see more of that as we move on.

Lia DeGroot | CQ Roll Call (00:12:19):

Hi. Thank you for doing this. I’m Leah DeGroot, I’m with cq. I wanted to ask kind of, I think at least from the outside, I was really surprised when that Pentagon announced its new policy always too. Yeah. And are you worried that this is kind of like a trial run by the Trump administration? This is something that they want to do at the White House or other branches of government? What is the signal for what’s to come for the media?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:12:52):

I don’t think it’s going to have effect on White House press coverage. He likes to talk. He likes to have people there, so that’s not going to happen. Other places state, I think, I’m not sure State has been, I’ve never been there reporting, but I understand they’re pretty much restricted to where they can and can’t go. There’s a little briefing room, I guess, here. Then they can go to the cafe. I understand. And I was talking to a former state guy who said, I hate going to that cafe because there’s always someone running up, some reporter trying to talk to me. So I don’t see it happening anywhere else really. Yeah, particularly the White House. He loves to come out and banter with reporters.

Audrey Decker | Defense One (00:13:37):

Hi Audrey with Politico. I just heard you on up first this morning when I was walking to the fellowship, so just so cool that you’re talking to us now.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:13:45):

It was not cool getting up at four 30. I love NPR and Inky. He’s one of my favorites. But to do that, you have to get up at four 30 in the morning, right? The alarm going, my phone goes off at four 30. First of all, you’re like, where am I? And then you have to throw down a cup of coffee so you’re at least half awake. And then Steve, great guy, but you have a script, right? It’s three minutes and 45 seconds, it sounds like a lot. It’s gone like that. And he starts saying, Hey, can we add this and put this in? I’m like, and then as a result, there are things you have to throw out over the side to get to that 3 45. It’s really tight. So we had to redo a couple of things. So it’s like, Tom, do you want to put this back in? I said, yeah, I want to put that back in. And then you’re done with it. It’s five 20 in the morning. It’s dark and you’re sitting there in your kitchen. It’s like, what do I do now? And then I just had a cup of coffee, so it’s hard to get to sleep. So I am in my workout stuff, so I’m just going to pass out on the couch or try to, and then your heart’s beating because you’ve just been on the radio and you try to change everything. You had a little coffee in you, and then you try to get to sleep, and then it’s like, what am I going to do today? What’s the follow on? And everything. Mine’s racing. It’s like again, five 20 in the morning, and then finally I pass out, and then I look at the clock, it’s nine 30. So yeah, we’re going to try to get them, this is an inside baseball test we’re trying to get them. Could we pre-tape the night before or late morning? These guys have to get up at three in the morning every day. Is there a way we can do it? The Sports Humane to us was, anyway. Yeah, too much information. Well, you sounded

Audrey Decker | Defense One (00:15:51):

Great,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:15:51):

But I just want one last thing. A lot of times I’ll go on and I’ll say things and I’ll say, did I make sense? I have no idea what I just said because I’m half asleep. So,

Audrey Decker | Defense One (00:16:04):

Well, I just wanted to ask you about the news of the week, and I know you don’t have a crystal ball, but I would love your heg Seth predictions because I think at one point this week with the second strike and stuff, and Trump was kind of distancing himself at first from the second strike, so it was maybe likely that Hgf could take the fall for this. And I think after the signal stuff, everybody was waiting. When will he take the fall? And I know some people think he will eventually, but yeah, just wondering what you’re hearing from inside the Pentagon and other sources on if he survives all this and Yeah.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:16:43):

Yeah. It’s all speculation. And I know back in April, I was told that Susie Wildes, white House chief of staff, Steven Miller and JD Vance were all sitting around thinking right at the signal gate happened, do we look for someone else? And I think that eventually kind of went away. The talk is now coming back about how long can he last? What are Republicans in particular saying on the hill? He could leave tomorrow, he could leave in a month from now. He may stick around. We just really have no idea what’s going to happen. There is talk more talk now about the Army secretary, Dan Driscoll, who of course is JD Vance’s roommate at Yale, who surprisingly was sent off to Ukraine to talk with senior Ukrainian officials. Listen, I’ve been doing this a long time. I’ve never seen a service secretary talk with leaders of another country that just never happens.

(00:17:43):

But he has the cachet of knowing Vance. He’s a pretty bright guy. So there’s even more talk now that he’s going to basically take over. Getting back to Laura Loomer, she’s on the attack about with me, or I think that might be mine. That’s called Sherwood Forest. My ring drum. Don’t worry about it. Yeah, that’s all right. Unless something really crazy has happened. So there’s talk that he could take over if he death fails. Laura Luer is attacking Driscoll because she hears she’s a friend of Pete Sack in the sense is she’s attacking Driscoll because he’s a rival. Because you never know about the infidelity message. Exactly. Yeah. So again, that’s one of the games in DC is who’s going to get fired. There was stories a few weeks ago about Cash Patel was going to get fired. It is one of those Washington parlor games. It happens all the time. And I do know when I was covering Rumsfeld, everyone thought he was such a pain in the ass on the hill that I do know. Then Senator John Water, who was chairman of the Armed Services Committee, he went to the White House and he said, we can’t deal with this guy Rumsfeld. He’s just a pain in the ass, blah, blah, blah. They were going to put this defense guy named John Hammering in that job who was kind of all set to go. Then nine 11 happened and Rumsfeld became this matinee idol. Remember helping with wounded people out of the building. So that never happened. So there’s a lot of people saying he could go again, we’ll just have to wait and see. But there can’t be any more mistakes, I think. I mean, at some point, if you really keep messing up the signal gate thing or something like that happens, your time is running out. I think

Speaker 5 (00:20:03):

I will get over here in a minute.

Hannah Demissie | ABC News (00:20:11):

Hi, my name is Hannah Demissie. I’m a White House reporter for a BC, and actually Vance is kind of my lane in terms of the White House, and I actually want to ask about Driscoll and from the defense side, how do people view him with who I’m with, a, B, C news and oh, Driscoll. I’m curious how people on the defense side view Driscoll, especially over these past few weeks having deal with all the Ukraine stuff, especially as rumors have pop up about apostle replacement. You talk about the lower luer stuff. Would the generals that you have talked to, they feel comfortable with the Driscoll as defense? He’s

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:20:56):

Guard, pretty affable guy, can get along with people, really smart. Restructuring the army, his big thing. And then he wants to buy a million drones over the next three years. So he’s kind of the drone expert. I think Trump calls him Mr. Drone or the Drone Guy or something like that. So again, pretty well thought of. So if he does take over, I think a lot of people will be really happy with that. Maybe we’ll get back in the building.

Sophie Hills | The Christian Science Monitor (00:21:31):

Hi, my name is Sophie. I’m with the Christian Science Monitor. So I’m curious how you think about balancing. I feel like there have been so many scandals that those stories obviously rise to the top and kind of have their own self-fulfilling nature and they stay in the news, but how do you balance that with still trying to anticipate? I just feel like I keep thinking there must be so many boring, bureaucratic things that are not happening where people got moved from that department, like Transgenic mikes or something, and they think like, oh, that’s not one of our priorities. But there’s a misunderstanding of what actually was happening in the department. Obviously that’s not the Pentagon, but that type of thing. And how do you balance thinking about covering those big stories, but also looking for the, they’re like day-to-day functions that maybe we don’t notice right now, but then six months from now there’s going to be some big issue because a whole department was disbanded or something.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:22:32):

Well, this is where you have to cover the big story, like the Pentagon IG report just came out, or they just hit this boat. You got to follow that, but you always want to have, this is where having sources is key. If you don’t have sources, you can’t do this job. You just can’t. And you can never have enough sources. So this is, I call it checking the traps. Before I came over here, after this crazy week, I wrote down a whole list of people I know that I had to get back in touch with. What are you hearing? What’s going on in this issue? That issue. I mean, I think that’s what we all have to do.

(00:23:14):

And again, building more and more sources. A guy that just called here right now is someone I’ve been trying to reach, and I’ll call him when I leave here. One of the issues with this guy is the National Guard troops coming to DC 500, have they named them yet? When are they going to come? And issues like that. And then with the Pentagon, we’re working on transgender issues. They’re trying to throw out 4,000, 5,000 transgender troops. We’re trying to get in touch with some of them. What are you hearing? What’s going on? So again, just reaching out to people or people you’re trying to reach out to on all these other issues. And then keeping in touch with sources and building more. They may say something you’ve never even thought of or heard of, like, we’re going to do this, or we’re going to cut this program, or we’re going to send active duty troops to Akron, or we were talking downstairs. This is the craziest time because almost every day something unusual is happening, something that you just never see before with this administration. It is highly unusual. I hope that helps. Yeah, thank you.

Hailey Bullis | Washington Examiner (00:24:34):

Hi, I’m Hailey Bullis with the Washington Examine, and I just wanted to keep talking about Souling, especially with this beat, there’s a lot of people that don’t want to talk to you and more shy about talking to the media or maybe just arent media trained. A lot of these defense officials, military guys, what is your opening move to storming these conversations and relationships with maybe people that aren’t so inclined to

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:25:02):

Yeah, well, if you’re new to the beat, most people here are fairly new to the beat. You can just call some of these people and say, Hey, listen, I just started this job with A, B, C or Washington. They were just trying to get up to speed on whether it’s health policy or defense policy. Can I buy you a cup of coffee at Starbucks across the street or in Pentagon City? I think that’s wise to do. And some people say, no, I don’t talk to reporters, find someone else. Just keep going and going and going until someone’s going to talk with you. Or again, these think tanks are pretty good. I think a lot of times we rely too much on think tanks. I have nothing against, listen, I have a master’s degree. I have nothing about higher education. A lot of times these people have PhDs in Middle East studies, and then you find out that they’ve never left the academy.

(00:25:56):

They really haven’t really gone anywhere. They’ve studied it. Give me someone that has practical experience and plus higher education chops. I think that’s key. And again, go to these conferences or there’s always someone saying, the Middle East Institute is going to have this thing next week. Come on by. And then just find out who’s there. Look at the name tags on the desk, who do I have to get in touch with who’d be good? And then just say, listen, I’m new to the beat, or I’m trying to get up to speed on Ukraine or Gaza or this or that. Can we sit down and talk? And then you ask that person, if you were me, who would you talk with? Who else should I know? Who really knows this issue better than anyone? And again, just snowballs. Like the Gaza story we were doing. I’ve never been to Gaza. I didn’t know a lot about it, but I know enough to basically find the people who really know the issue, particularly with humanitarian aid and what went wrong, what was going on behind the scenes, how they were pressuring Netanyahu, we got all that stuff. It actually turned out to be quite good. That help. Yeah,

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:27:12):

Shit hasn’t hit the fan, right?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:27:14):

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Shrai Popat | The Guardian (00:27:16):

Thanks so much. I’m Shrai with the Guardian. I wanted to ask a question about, to your point about reaching out more to members of Congress now, given the restrictions of the Pentagon, whether you think that Democrats are doing a successful job in trying to combat a lot of the Republican marketing around fake press Pentagon and generally sort of undermining the military, particularly in thinking about the quote unquote Seditious six video, the way that certain democratic members of Congress have reacted this week to Signal Gate to the Doubletrack tap strike. I’m just curious whether you are watching that and seeing that and seeing how they’re responding as whether it’s successful or an effective strategy against that Who, who’s just the democratic members of Congress who are responding to that in particular?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:28:04):

I’m not sure the politics of it. I really don’t do the politics. My interest is getting a hold of as many people as I can, Republicans and Democrats and just sit down with them. I mean, there was one Republican congressman, I spent a lot of time in Afghanistan and the Argen Valley north of Kandahar, and I noticed this fairly new congressman, pat Harrigan from North Carolina. I was reading his bio because I saw him on tv. I said, God, this guy’s actually pretty good. He was in that same area the same time I did was there. So I call up this press person and use that as an entry and just sitting down and talk with him, right? Hey, we have this thing in common. Can I come to your office and talk? And we had a really good conversation. So you try to find a way in to talk to these people.

(00:28:48):

But as far as commenting on the video that they put out, good idea, bad idea, what are people saying about it? That’s really not my thing. In the fake news thing, we only really hear that from Trump and Hegseth and a few others. I don’t think too many members of Congress are using that term because they want to get out there and talk to the press too, get their point of view across. So you may hear that from some right on the very fringes, but I don’t think a lot of them say that again, reach out to members of Congress, particularly their staffs, depending on what your area of interest is. We can’t do enough of that. Starting with me, I got to do more of that.

Cybele Mayes-Osterman | USA Today (00:29:35):

Hi, I’m Cybele. I also cover the Pentagon National Security for USA today. I guess what I’m wondering is for a beat on a beat that relies so much on relationships that go back years, people that you’ve known for a long time, this kind of thing is how the beat seems to function. What tips do you have for a reporter like me who is new to covering the speed and at this time that has all these new unprecedented difficulties where the usual ways that you kind of get into the network through PAOs and flax and these kinds of things are really dried up during the current environment?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:30:21):

I wish I could give you more hope, but it’s incredibly difficult for someone just starting to cover the Pentagon. You can’t go there. And again, you can’t call the PAOs. And again, I would say to them, I’m new to the beat. Can we grab a cup of coffee or something? I would do that. The retired community can be pretty good. Some of them are at places like Foundation for Defensive Democracy, which is a pretty good shop center for New American Security. They have a lot of people over there and they do really good background briefings. You have to find ways in. And again, getting back to the Staff Armed Services Committee, reach out to the staffers. I mean all those members of the Armed services have committee staff members. I would just start calling every goddamn one of them, right? I’m new to the beat.

(00:31:12):

Can I, you start with the press office and then say, who’s your committee staffer? Can we all get together and just talk? I’m interested in? They say, no, just go to the next person. Right down the list. Some of them will talk. Again, it’s a labor intensive. You can’t go to the Pentagon. But when this all started, they were throwing us out of the Pentagon. There was a colleague of mine that was complaining to a marine officer, said, oh, they’re throwing us out. Poors us, poors me. And he said to her, be a Marine. The Marines would find a way around this, just basically suck it up and find a way around it. And I love that because I think he’s absolutely right. You going to screw us. I don’t think that’s going to happen because we’re going to find out what’s going on.

Cybele Mayes-Osterman | USA Today (00:32:02):

Can I ask one follow up about the boat strikes? So I guess what I’m wondering is we seem to be in this situation where the administration, I see there are a lot of stories rightfully so about the legality of the strikes, but we seem to have an administration here that is not concerned that much about the legality question. It feels like in past times it was like you uncover the facts that these questionable, all the uncovering of questionable things that the military might’ve done during the global War on terror or something like this. But now we’re in this situation where we have videos being posted openly on social media where the legality of the strike is questionable. What do you think about that and how to cover that angle of the legality of the military in this time? We’ve

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:33:02):

Been doing a lot on that, talking with former judge advocate generals, former general counsels, the legal rationale we’re told, and interestingly, the memo from Justice laying out the legal rationale is classified.

(00:33:17):

And basically what I’m told, it says it never mentions Venezuela. It mentions votes carrying drugs to the United States, which kill Americans, and they use some of that money to buy weapons. So since they’re killing Americans, we can kill those people. So a lot of people you talk with say that’s very thin legal rationale for this kind of thing. But if you have a lawyer that says, it looks good to me, sir, and you’re firing judge advocate generals in the military, I think what we’re seeing is, again, questionable legal rationale, but all we can do is go to people who used to do these jobs and just say, what do you think about this? They’re going to say, I just think it’s illegal. And we just basically say, this is what they’re saying and this is the administration’s policy, and keep hearing that home. We’re going to see more and more of that. I think with this recent strike, the rationale they’re using for the second strike was the guys were still on the boat now. The boat was flipped over, and the rationale they used were two things that they could still potentially get their communications and communicate with their comrades. And the other rationale was they’re trying to flip over the remains of the boat. That was the rationale. They used to strike it again. Now, a lot of people would say, are you kidding me? But that’s the rationale they used, and now it’s up to Congress and others to basically hold more hearings if they can. The Republican may just say, we’re done with this. I think it’s all over, but we’ll see what happens. But the legal of rationale is still a very, very serious question.

Skylar Woodhouse | Bloomberg News (00:35:26):

Thanks for being here. I’m Skylar Woodhouse, a White House reporter with Bloomberg News. Two questions. You mentioned earlier that you’re essentially having to hustle more in this new era of hustling, just what has really worked for you as you maybe tap back into old roots. And then secondly, the administration, the Pentagon, they moved what the USS forward to from where they were stationed all the way to now in the Caribbean Sea. Just curious your thoughts on that moving of how telling is that about the administration to take such a massive resource from one part of the world all the way to the other? And is it, it’s

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:36:15):

Almost unprecedented that you would move a carrier from the Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean and they’re making a port visit in Croatia and then move it all the way halfway around the world. I believe I’ve read that 15% of the entire Navy fleet is in the Caribbean now. So the question is what’s the way ahead? Is it saber rattling? Is it to go after drugs? Is it really drugs or is it more Maduro? You’re trying to get rid of him? Trump has acknowledged that he’s spoken with Maduro, so right. It’s just what is the way ahead here? What is all this about? Because you can’t think it’s only about drugs because if you blow away a couple of dozen boats carrying Coke, many of them were destined for Europe, by the way, that semis, submersible summary, they took out, and by the way, rescue two survivors, one from Ecuador, one from Columbia. That thing was at a heading for Europe that wasn’t going to the United States. And a lot of these do in the Caribbean head toward Europe or Africa, especially those semi-submersibles. There’s one on display to this day in Key West Florida, and it’s about as long as this room, you would not want to get on this thing, which is why it’s semi-submersible, but they’re not really telling the truth about where a lot of this stuff is going.

(00:37:42):

But yeah, again, where’s this heading? Why are they doing it? It’s still an open question.

Hannah Demissie | ABC News (00:37:50):

Hi, I just had a question just because yesterday and this morning on my feed, I have been seeing more articles from some publications about the impeachment process of a sitting secretary. They were geared towards Seth. And I’m curious from you, if you’re, that would probably be very extreme. I don’t think we’ve ever had a Secretary impeach, correct me if I’m wrong, but are you hearing from members of Congress that’s getting to a point where they feel like HS is really unable to do his job or lead effectively, or would action come generally first from the White House or from members of Congress is what I’m essentially asking.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:38:34):

He was going to impeach him. Since Republicans run Congress, a number of Republicans so far have said We stand behind Hegseth. He made a mistake with Samuel Gate. One congressman I saw said he hasn’t done that since then.

Speaker 5 (00:38:49):

So

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:38:50):

I think I can stand behind him. So yeah, the Democrats are saying he should be fired or he should resign. I haven’t seen any Republican at this point who agrees with that view that he should just go. But again, like I said, with Rumsfeld time, they’re not going to announce to the press or anything. We think so-and-so should leave. They’re going to go to the White House and say, you know what? Maybe it’s time for someone else to come in. So we’ll just see what happens in the coming weeks or so. There can’t be any more mistakes like this. I think that’s my gut because then some Republicans may start saying, we can’t have this anymore. So we’ll see.

Cady Stanton | Tax Notes (00:39:42):

Hi, I am Cady Stanton And I work for Tax Notes. You talked a lot about the new Pentagon Press policy kind of obviously being iced out in terms of access, but there’s also been a trend not just towards icing out the press, but actually attacking the press, I think of the new list on the White House website of individual names and outlets for people. How has that also kind of affected your ability to do your job, if at all, beyond just not having access but actually being attacked, whether it’s on social media, through press conferences, et cetera?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:40:14):

I haven’t really been attacked on social media. I get comments every once in a while from people on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram and so forth. I really don’t pay much attention to it. Some of my colleagues will actually reach out to people who are attacking them. I think that’s unwise. Just let sleeping dogs lie. It’s not going to help anybody. And those people you’re attacking love to just keep this train rolling, right? You’re fake news or I’m the real Pentagon Press Corps now it’s just unwise to stay away from that. It doesn’t matter what the White House says about this press that press attacking us. We are all doing our jobs, I think, and you have to expect that. It’s just highly unusual under this administration. I mean, let’s face it, a lot of white houses don’t like the press. You think Clinton liked the press with Monica Lewinsky and Biden with the stories about he’s too old, he should resign. I mean, most administrations don’t like the press, and we all have to accept that and just say, well, we’re going to do our job, and you can say whatever you want, and I’m here to ask questions. The challenging thing with this current administration is you ask a legitimate question. It’s like, well, who are you from? It’s like, that’s fake news. Okay. How about you? I mean, that’s troubling about people covering the White House now, is that whole thing,

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:41:48):

Has that, okay. Is it time to change the strategy though, of remaining quiet? When you have a principal attacking you, disparagingly, either personally, your outlet, is it ever acceptable in your view anyway, to answer back and say,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:42:12):

That would be my gut to answer back. I’m not sure what it’s going to get you. I don’t like what he says or anyone else says fake news. I think I would stop from there and say, hang on a second. It’s not fake news, but it might make you feel good. But does it mean anything? Maybe for people watching, they would like to see something like that. I don’t know. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stand there and have people say that.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (00:42:47):

Yeah. Is it beholding to the Press Corps or of any one of those institutions to kind of join together and react in support of people in the moment, or do you think that’s not,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:43:05):

Again, it would make you feel good, but what’s the practical impact of that? It would be just more the Trump show, I think ending the press conference, soaring everyone out. What have you achieved besides a good feeling? I think a member of Congress would say that in a scrum at the Capitol, I think you could maybe challenge that person. But with Trump, it’s just, again, he was just calling someone else. I suppose what you could say is point to you, and I’m going to tell you, well, Mr. President, you said that’s fake news. I mean, you could do something like that. I’m not sure if the Press Corps is cohesive enough to mount that kind of a strategy. And again, what would it achieve?

(00:43:56):

Right? You’d get TV news would pick it up. Brian Se, the guy on CNN may say, oh, today at the briefing this happened. But what does it mean? I mean, the important thing is, and we saw this during rumsfeld’s time, ask a question, a well honed question of whoever it is, and if they don’t answer, oftentimes whoever it is, public officials is not going to answer your question. They’re going to answer the question they want you to answer. He’d just be persistent. Well, thanks for your answer, but you didn’t answer my question and let me ask it again. And this happened all the time during Rumsfeld, and he wouldn’t answer sometimes three times. And he said to me once, how many times are you going to ask that? But the people watching at home or listening say, yeah, got it. He’s tap dancing. And that’s where it can be a little more effective. Yeah.

Hailey Bullis | Washington Examiner (00:45:00):

Hi. I just had two more questions, but one is kind of related to what’s going on with Heus and his leadership. Admiral ey is retiring I think next week, and what’s been Upholded, at least due to conflict with Hegseth himself. Do you think we will see mole retirements like that? And is that kind of from what you’re hearing from inside common conflict within the department right now?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:45:31):

I think we probably will see. We’re seeing more retirements at the kernel level.

(00:45:36):

This guy I know who has shifted from his job because he put something on Facebook supporting us. Afghan allies more should come the United States. They removed him because of that. And he told me that you have to go through this transition program when you’re leaving the military that rank or higher. And this guy told me that transition office has never been busier. People are just saying, I’m out of here. Halsey, I was told, had reservations about these attacks on the alleged drug boats. He’s leaving one year into a three year tour. And people I talk with on the hill say they have never seen this happen. Somebody one year into their tour retires while there. There’s basically fighting going on in his A OR. They’ve never seen that happen. Now the question is, is he going to say anything? He’s retiring next week, I guess. Is he going to say anything kind of like what Millie did when he left? Yeah. Or is he just going to say as an honor to blah, blah, blah, and then move off into the sunset? I’d be surprised if he said anything, but he may we’ll have to see what happens. And then the question is, are you going to bring him up to the hill for

(00:46:56):

Any hearings? Which would be a good idea. But again, who runs Congress?

Hailey Bullis | Washington Examiner (00:47:01):

And then secondly, with this administration and just reporting right now, there’s a lot of anonymous sources that all talking to Pols and giving us the inside look to the administration and what’s going on in the White House. But there’s also a lot of debate about whether or not we should be using anonymous sources as much as we all, especially with how the White House and the administration is toning around and just saying, well, these are not trustworthy because they’re anonymous kind of thing. Do you think we over rely on anonymous sources or do you think it’s a necessary thing to make sure that we all getting the inside perspectives that we wouldn’t get otherwise?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:47:46):

I think they’re overused and they’re necessary, especially in Washington. You see this all the time in Washington. You would like to have people go on the record, but if they’re giving you information and their boss doesn’t think that’s a good idea, would you sacrifice your job going on the record? That’s what you have to ask yourself. And most people would say no. Sometimes the boss knows this person is giving information along those lines. Before the IG report came out, I got like five or six paragraphs, basically the whole thing, while I was in the studio talking about something else. And I’m looking at my phone like, holy shit. And then we ran out and the person said, don’t quote this verbatim, but this is what the report says. It came out the next day and that person didn’t want the name used, but it was gold.

(00:48:45):

It was right. And this is, again, getting back to sources. You have to have a blanket of sources, a web of sources, because somebody may be telling you something to stick it to someone else. And this other guy would say, Tom, what you heard from this person, that’s about 50%, right? This is kind of what’s really going on here. And again, getting back to the boat, some people said, well, it was just debris. They were clinging onto debris like the Titanic or something. And then other people said, no, there was actually a boat there. So it’s all this. What do you see when you’re looking at the video? Do I see debris? Do I see a hull? And guys, is that a boat? Is that debris, right? What about communications? Well, the ability to try to communicate was one of the reasons they used to strike the boat again, others said, no, they had a radio. They’re trying to reach out to people. So you have all this stew of information about that, which is why you have to reach out to as many people as possible. Yeah, anonymous sources. It’s the wave of the present at the past and the future in Washington. It’s just the way it works. But a lot of people agree to say too many anonymous sources, but you have to trust your sources too.

(00:50:06):

And sometimes they may be half, and you have to be careful.

Speaker 5 (00:50:15):

Thank you.

Cybele Mayes-Osterman | USA Today (00:50:20):

Given your experience covering Rumsfeld, what do you think about the parallels, the comparisons that are being made right now between what’s going on with regards to Venezuela and the precursors to the Iraq war?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:50:38):

That was completely different. Everybody knew they were going to go to war in Iraq. I mean, they sent all the military equipment over there. They gave him an ultimatum. You knew something was going to happen, right? Because you’ve been talking about it for a long time. And everybody I talked with in the Pentagon, they knew it was going to be an attack. They were worried they were not going to send enough forces to complete the job and police Iraq right after Saddam fell. So we all knew what the Pentagon was definitely going to happen. The question is what was the date? Right? That was the only concern With this thing. Again, I’m talking to Maduro. We may hit land targets.

(00:51:26):

We’re going to go after the drug boats. No, we may go after his government. So it’s this mishmash of information coming from Trump, coming from the hill, coming from the Pentagon. There’s no question the Iraq thing before that, Afghanistan, no question was going to happen. Absolutely none. They tried to talk to Sadan to leave. They gave him the ultimatum, but we knew that was going to happen, no question in Afghanistan, even more so. I mean Bush remember at nine 11 in New York, basically said, we’re going to do it. Pretty soon they’re going to hear from us, right?

Grant Schwab | The Detroit News (00:52:09):

Thanks for doing this, Tom. I’m Grant Schwab. I’m a Washington correspondent for the Detroit News. I’m mostly on the autos beat, and I’m not squarely defense law. Occasionally there are at some intersection, so I’m not in this world every day, but what I see is a constant stream levels of scandal. It’s scandal after scandal. It’s kind of like the Steve Band muzzle velocity kind of thing. But as someone who’s in this world and has been doing it a while, what things are happening structurally or thematically that isn’t a arising to the headline level? That is a big frigging deal in the world of military and defense for this country that is getting buried right now. And 15 years from now, we’ll look back and say, that was really important about this era.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:52:54):

No, I think getting back to the drones in Driscoll, buying all those drones, millions of drones. What are you buying? What are you not buying? And if you’re going to buy all these drones, what are you sacrificing in your defense budget not to buy? Is it going to be, we’re not going to build another aircraft carrier, is it? We’re not going to build another submarine. All of that going on. And then looking at China, we’ve kind of forgotten about China and the South China Sea, the military challenges. Taiwan, Ukraine is still kind of front burner, but those issues, working with the alliances, are you going to cut troops in Europe? So all of that kind of stuff going on, particularly in the Far East. What are you doing in exercises with let’s say Singapore? With the Philippines? I was going to go out to the Philippines with the Marines.

(00:53:44):

They were going to do this kind of little war game out there, and that kind of fell through. But that’s the kind of thing I would want to spend more time doing, go out to the Pacific. That is the future. Something’s going to happen there. We just don’t know what that is. And then our Iraq, I still want to get back to Iraq and do stories about going out to the remnants of isis. I spent a lot of time there also in Syria. This is huge prison called Al Hall. It’s this prison camp with 44,000 women and children in it. It’s a hell of a story, and there’s worry that it’s going to be a jihadi university if you can’t send those people back to their home countries. Many of them are Syrian and Iraq Iraqi, but some are come from the United States, from Britain, France, Germany, Tajikistan.

(00:54:36):

Some try to get over there to do more stories on that. We actually did a story, my colleague, Sasha Pfeiffer did a story well, I helped her with, because I know the people dealing with it. They got two kids, American kids that were in this Al Hall camp back to the grandparents out of Michigan or Minnesota. It’s a hell of a story because the son decided to fight for ISIS and got married to a woman, I think from North Africa. They had a couple of kids, and these kids are just languishing in there, but they were Americans. So more stories like that I find fascinating, that kind of stuff, China. But yeah, I mean, you got to focus on the crazy story of the day.

(00:55:26):

I keep telling people we’re like short order cooks. There’s something in the griddle, it’s your omelet, but I’m making oatmeal in the back stove. It’s not bubbling yet. And then over here I’m making a souffle. So we’re doing that every single day. And you always want to have a long-term story you’re working on. Could be China, can I get over there and go a training exercise? And of course, we’re all about sound, so you want guys hitting the beach. You want the Osprey coming in and landing, or you want to hear the sounds of Al Hall Camp people yelling, screaming, and so forth. So yeah, I mean, there are probably thousand stories out there that we just don’t have time to chase or happening under the radar. And one of the reasons is no one’s talking with us to the Pentagon.

Mia McCarthy | Politico (00:56:28):

Hi, thanks for doing this. I’m Mia McCarthy. I work for Politico covering Capitol Hill. I’m also from Boston. Great. Or both? West Rock. Oh, okay. Yeah. I wanted to ask about, sorry, the Go Pass. We’re coming back. Dynasty part two. Anyways. Too long. It’s been way too long. Do you know how awesome it was growing up in Boston from two, anyways, anyway, so I’m coming a little reporter. I know you’re saying now that you’re relying on a lot of Capitol Hill sources, I guess, have you seen your Hill sources be more or less reliant given the current situation with Pentagon? And I guess, do you have any concerns that Capitol Hill has a ton of press access right now? I guess not that it would necessarily reach the level of what the Pentagon has right now, but do you think any of that is going to be, I don’t know necessarily taken back if more leaks are happening through the congressional route?

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:57:27):

I don’t think so. Yeah, I think members of Congress love to get out there and talk, right? You can’t prevent that. They want to do that. And more and more Pentagon reporters are showing up in the hill. Friends of mine are going up there even more running around talking to people. I probably should get up there. I don’t have a hill pass anymore, but maybe I should get one and just hang out there even more. But I don’t see it. I mean, everybody leaves, especially as you give it to Congress. You must have just announced it in Lafayette. I want you to give it to Congress. Everybody knows that. Every administration knows that. And that’s why a lot of times they won’t give it to the Hill until they’re ready to announce it,

Speaker 5 (00:58:05):

Because

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:58:05):

They know as soon as it goes up. And that IG report went up to the hill on Monday. It only took a day and a half.

Speaker 5 (00:58:16):

Yeah,

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:58:18):

Pretty slow. No, that actually was pretty slow. I

Speaker 5 (00:58:21):

Was surprised.

Hannah Demissie | ABC News (00:58:34):

You were talking earlier about how there are more retirements happening on the defense side than there seems to be in a long time. Is there a concern with some people in the defense world about the rate of replacement of those people? I assume they’re so experienced in what they did. I’m just curious if there’s a concern of whether or not there’s enough people to replace those who are leaving who had so much experience.

Tom Bowman/NPR (00:59:01):

No, there’s definitely a concern. You’re losing very experienced people who are really good. You can always find someone to plug in to that job. Are they any good? Some of the positions they’ve announced to the Pentagon, some of the officers are, let’s say less than stellar. I’m not going to mention any names, but there’s a concern about some of the people they put key positions. The good news for everybody is the officers they have in key positions, like at Central Command, the Pacific. And in Europe, I know all of those people, two of them pretty well, and they’re really, really good people, really solid. They’re not talking with us, but they’re still pretty good people. Are there concerns those people could possibly leave or are those conclusions No, I think they’re going to stick around and they know enough to kind of another radar. They’re not going to say anything that we jeopardize them.

Sophie Hills | The Christian Science Monitor (01:00:08):

You mentioned sometime earlier that the retired general, I think, who didn’t want to be seen meeting with you and the chilling effect. And obviously right now they’re investigating. Kelly, I’m not entirely clear on whether that actually could turn any into anything tangibly inconvenient for him, but why our retired, I mean, what reasons would a retired officer have to be concerned about that aside from maybe they just want to preserve their own access? Is that the main reason?

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:00:41):

No, this person still works for the federal government.

Sophie Hills | The Christian Science Monitor (01:00:44):

Oh, retired from, oh, I see. Retired uniform, but not from government. I see. But then which among going to weird,

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:00:50):

It’s like who’s going to see you walk into NP?

Sophie Hills | The Christian Science Monitor (01:00:54):

Well, some people do have my opinions of themselves. I know. I agree. No. So then in among the retired community who are not working in government, are you noticing a chilling effect?

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:01:09):

Yes.

Sophie Hills | The Christian Science Monitor (01:01:10):

And is that just personal reputation and they want to be able to not have their access cut off

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:01:17):

And women leave the uniformed service and go over for the defense industry. So a lot of ’em don’t want to talk because I’m working for, let’s say Lockheed or something. And if I get out there and sign some letter or they’ll put pressure on the company, why are you still hiring this guy’s a strange time?

(01:01:41):

And the whole Kelly thing, some people are critical of him saying that. I’ve heard some people retired generals on TV saying he didn’t have to do that because it undermines the active of duty military. Of course we’re going to tell him, you don’t have to fall in legal order. One guy said, it kind of makes us look bad. And also nothing he said. The other said in that video, they never mentioned Trump. They never mentioned the Caribbean. They never mentioned what’s going on with the drug boats. They basically just said, you have to follow the law. You don’t have to follow illegal orders, period. So what’s the rationale for court martial? Tell me. So I think that’s just going to go away. It’s just

Speaker 5 (01:02:24):

Harassment.

Audrey Decker | Defense One (01:02:31):

I know you said that most of the Republicans on the hill have defended HEGs, but I’m wondering, do you see a point, or have you talked to people privately where they do reach a breaking point? Because I know especially with Wicker, he was really angry that they weren’t being given information. The whole bridge, Kolbe stuff, that with taking troops from Europe, they were upset publicly about some of the things that Hegseth has done. But do you think that would ever amount to ’em taking a stand on it, I guess? Or is it more just like private concerns?

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:03:08):

That’s a really good point. I haven’t seen anything that Wicker has said so far about Hegseth, about the truck, both to double tap. He’s going to be a key person to watch, and I keep telling our people we should just sit outside of office, get a sleeping bag, a sleep out there. Just wait for him to come out and basically say, what do you think? You’re pretty upset about that you’re going to have a hearing. I’m not even sure if anyone’s even reached out to him and even ask them that simple question again, he’s going to be the key person and Thune it will as well. But even more so Wicker is how far is he going to go with this? Or is he going to say, well, I think we’re good. We had a briefing from the Good Admiral and we’re okay. I mean, that’s going to be something interesting to watch next week.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (01:03:57):

I have one more question before I let you go, and thank you for spending this time with this. I asked this of a justice department or former Justice Department official who was here last month, and maybe the boat strike is this moment, but what would you be looking for to get a sense that the fabric of the place of the institution has been altered in a way that has some permanency? Is it the boat strike and the judgment calls that are being made there, or is there something that you’re looking for that says, yeah, this place has gone down the rabbit hole?

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:04:44):

It’s hard to say. The boat strike was questionable. I think with a lot of people, the legal rationale from justice is pretty thin gruel. I think most people would argue, I don’t see anything really over the top beyond that. That could happen. I would look for, I’ve never seen this happen like a senior person resigning and then saying, I’m resigning because of what I’m seeing in this administration. I’ve never seen that happen. If that happens, then I think that that’s very serious.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (01:05:24):

So you’re looking pretty closely at Halsey. Yeah.

Tom Bowman/NPR (01:05:28):

We’ll see if he says anything that would be of interest, I would doubt it because again, you look at Mark Kelly and they could bring him back active of duty and court martial him or threaten him or say, you are not going to be able to work in any defense industry, or We’re going to make sure you don’t serve in any boards. So I think a lot of these people, the sense I get from talking to people that he’ll just go quietly into that good night.

Kevin Johnson/NPF (01:05:59):

Well, that’s probably a good place to drop it. Unfortunately, we’re out of time, but join me in thanking Tom for spending the time.