As Townhall has been covering, liberal mainstream media outlets have been putting out pieces against Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. NPR even claimed that the White House was reportedly looking for his replacement, though White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stressed, including to Townhall, that such a story was "completely fake," and blasted their dependency on anonymous sources. Another anonymous source piece is out, with a headline from CBS News on Wednesday declaring that "Hegseth orders makeup studio installed at Pentagon."
According to such a piece [with original emphasis]:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recently ordered modifications to a room next to the Pentagon press briefing room to retrofit it with a makeup studio that can be used to prepare for television appearances, multiple sources told CBS News.
The price tag for the project was several thousand dollars, according to two of the sources, at a time when the administration is searching for cost-cutting measures.
"Changes and upgrades to the Pentagon Briefing Room are nothing new and routinely happen during changes in an administration," a Defense Department spokesperson said in a statement to CBS News.
The renovation that was initially planned was estimated to cost more than $40,000, but the ideas were scaled back, sources said.
Hegseth, before becoming defense secretary, was a morning show co-host on Fox News' "Fox & Friends Weekend." Since his nomination, he has vowed to emphasize improvements in the armed forces' warfighting abilities and military readiness.
An in-house construction crew renovated the adjacent green room earlier this year. The room previously had minimal furnishings — a table with chairs, a TV, photos of former defense secretaries and a mirror on the back of the door, one source said.
The table was removed and a new chair and large mirror with makeup lighting was installed, another source said.
Hegseth is doing his own makeup ahead of TV appearances, not paying for a makeup artist, a defense official told CBS News.
The suggestion for improving the space came from Tami Radabaugh, the deputy assistant to the secretary for strategic engagement and a former producer for Fox News and for CBS News, according to multiple sources. The chief Pentagon spokesman, Sean Parnell, and the defense secretary's wife, Jennifer Hegseth, also a former Fox producer, expressed their approval for the upgrade before it was undertaken, one of the sources said.
The Defense Department spokesperson said the green room will be available to senior leaders and VIPs prior to press engagements.
The new items, including a director's chair, came from existing inventories, the spokesperson said. A new countertop was constructed by facilities services staff.
"For this upgrade we were deliberately conservative and opted for several less expensive, on-hand materiel solutions," the spokesperson said.
The article was published on Wednesday, with Jennifer Jacobs, one of the authors, sharing the article to her X account that same afternoon. The article was also updated, though, and as Sister Toldjah at our sister site of RedState highlighted when covering this CBS News hit piece, the outlet was forced to walk back their claims.
Jacobs, hours after her initial post, also added subsequent posts, including with statements from the administration.
As initially planned, the renovations to the green room makeup studio in the Pentagon were going to cost more than $40,000, sources told me, but the ideas were scaled back.
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) April 23, 2025
An archived version of the article from 1:50pm did not include the bolded portions of the excerpts above.
In between when the original post was shared and the new paragraphs were added, the DOD Rapid Response put out several posts taking issue with the story, including a quoted repost of Jacobs. That post included a picture of the actual green room, which the DOD Rapid Response stressed "came from existing inventory." It also stressed that the story was "fake news."
Another post highlighted another issue with the "fake news" media, with this one calling the media out for being "desperate and worthless" when it comes to how the Biden-Harris administration actually used a completely fake office for then President Joe Biden to conduct business when he was quite clearly in decline.
Does the fake news NOT have anything better to do?
— DOD Rapid Response (@DODResponse) April 23, 2025
1. No lighted mirror.
2. It didn't cost thousands.
3. The items that were added to the GREEN ROOM (not a makeup studio) came from existing inventory.
This story is TRASH! https://t.co/hOrF5VNqcg pic.twitter.com/FQzXX4QgpW
So the desperate and worthless media wants to talk about a “green room” in the Pentagon…..🤔🤔 pic.twitter.com/JgCI9cKPXQ
— DOD Rapid Response (@DODResponse) April 23, 2025
Even though Biden was so clearly incompetent, that was clearly different to the mainstream media, because there was a Democratic administration in charge.
Such a piece comes off as even more biased, given as it tries to portray the Trump administration as a hypocritical one when it comes to looking to cut costs. There's also that curious paragraph on Hegseth formerly working for Fox News as a television host and how "he has vowed to emphasize improvements in the armed forces' warfighting abilities and military readiness," as if the green room, especially in its actual capacity, would interfere with that.
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