PENTAGON, FURIOUS OVER UNFLATTERING PRESS PHOTOS, GIVES HEGSETH FULL CONTROL OF HIS OWN IMAGE BY SEATING HIM ALONE IN AUTOMATED PHOTO BOOTH
Pentagon bars press photographers over ‘unflattering’ Hegseth photos
The Defense Department has barred press photographers from briefings on the ongoing U.S.-Israeli military conflict with Iran after they published photos of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that his staff deemed “unflattering,” according to two people familiar with the decision who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.
Washington Post March 11, 2026
THE RUTABAGA
“Journalism Adjacent Since Whenever”
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Pentagon, having reached its absolute limit with credentialed press photographers capturing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in ways that failed to convey what staffers described as “the full gravitas situation,” this week enacted a sweeping solution to the nation’s most pressing image crisis: they handed Hegseth a token, pointed him toward an automated photo booth in the Pentagon parking lot, and told him to sit professionally.
The decision came after photographers from major wire services, during a rare Pentagon briefing last week, committed what internal communications reportedly called “an ongoing pattern of accurate documentation.” The resulting images — described by Hegseth’s team as “unflattering,” and by everyone else as “photographs” — were deemed unacceptable for a man of the Secretary’s stature, bearing, and communications budget.
“The problem,” explained a senior Pentagon image consultant, a role that did not exist eight weeks ago, “was that we couldn’t control the photographers. So we asked ourselves: what if we just... removed them entirely? What if the Secretary was solely, completely, one hundred percent in charge of how he was portrayed?”
The booth, a standard four-shot automated strip model typically found outside drugstores and in the lobbies of laser tag facilities, was identified as the ideal solution.
“No outside variables,” the consultant continued. “No lenses. No angles. No agenda. Just the Secretary, a curtain, and a countdown timer. What could go wrong.”
WHAT WENT WRONG
According to three sources with direct knowledge of the photo booth encounter, Hegseth was given clear and specific instructions: sit still, face forward, look like the civilian leader of the most powerful military on earth.
The booth’s four-frame strip, recovered by Rutabaga staff, tells a different story.
Frame one: eyes crossed.
Frame two: what sources describe as “the face you make when someone says something you think is wrong but you’re trying to be polite about it, but you’re not being polite about it.”
Frame three: unclear. Investigators are still working on frame three.
Frame four: a single thumbs up, chin tilted at an angle that one former Defense attaché called “concerningly rakish.”
“He had one job,” said a Pentagon communications aide who has since applied for a transfer. “The booth doesn’t have opinions. The booth doesn’t have an agenda. The booth just takes the picture when the light flashes. And somehow — somehow — he made faces and this is what we got.”
MEANWHILE, ABROAD
At the time of the photo booth session, U.S. forces remained deployed across multiple active theaters. Defense appropriations remained in active negotiation. Several allied nations had placed calls to the Pentagon that had not yet been returned.
The calls went unreturned for an additional 35 minutes while staff attempted to determine whether any of the four frames were usable.
None were.
“We’re going back Tuesday,” the aide confirmed. “We’re bringing a stool this time. And a talking-to.”
THE PRESS, FOR ITS PART
The accredited photographers who had been banned from Pentagon briefings following last week’s images issued a joint statement noting that they had simply pointed their cameras at the Secretary of Defense and pressed a button — the same process, one photographer observed, as the booth.
“The booth got better pictures,” the statement read.
The Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment, but did email over an unsolicited headshot of Hegseth taken outside the booth that they described as “more representative.”
In it, he is not making a face.
He is, however, doing the thumbs up.
The nation’s conflicts continue. The booth is still in the parking lot.
— The Rutabaga | “We report. You wonder why.” Tips, corrections, and carnival photo strips: tips@therutabaga.net
FTS
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