Pete Hegseth has spent over a year restricting the Pentagon press corps. All the while, he’s been quietly running a covert messaging operation on the side. Jennica Pounds—better known to her nearly one million X followers as “DataRepublican”—has been secretly working as a special government employee at the Pentagon since July, even while publicly attacking Hegseth’s internal rivals and critics without disclosing she was on the department’s payroll.
Mediaite reports:
Pounds’s Pentagon employment came to light after a bizarre incident in which she claimed she was being “set up” by the deep state—but it was revealed she merely botched a “scoop” she was being handed by a State Department official. Up until June, Pounds was a member of the credentialed Pentagon press corps. She had not disclosed her new gig with the Pentagon. … CBS News’ National Security Coordinating Producer Jim LaPorta also confirmed, “DoD: ‘Ms. [Jennica] Pounds serves at the Department of War as a Special Government Employee and is no longer a credentialed journalist at the Pentagon. Her PFAC (press credential) expired in June 2026, and she did not seek a renewal. She began working for the Department in July 2026.’”
IBTimes UK reports that Pounds isn’t the only Hegseth-friendly account facing scrutiny:
The episode has also renewed scrutiny of Adam D’Ortona, an active-duty Army lieutenant colonel with more than 100,000 followers on X who has criticised congressional Democrats and backed Hegseth’s push against diversity and inclusion programmes at the Pentagon.
D’Ortona was reported last September to be working inside Hegseth’s office. However, Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson said at the time he was not an adviser or spokesperson for the department. D’Ortona denied this week that the Pentagon pays anyone to “post stories,” and both the Army and Hegseth’s office declined to answer further questions about his role.
This is not a simple undisclosed-conflict story. Pounds used her platform to take shots at Hegseth’s own internal critics—including Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, with whom Hegseth has openly clashed—all while hiding that she was on his department’s books. Throttling access for actual reporters while secretly employing an “independent” influencer to fight his personal and political battles—that’s the Hegseth way.
The Executive Watch is a project of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, and its flagship publication The UnPopulist, to track in an ongoing way the abuses of the power of the American presidency. It sorts these abuses into five categories: Personal Grift, Political Corruption, Presidential Retribution, Power Consolidation, and Policy Illegality. Click the category of interest to get an overview of all the abuses under it.
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