<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Employees of the congressionally funded <em>Stars and Stripes</em> newspaper filed a lawsuit on Thursday to prevent the <a href="https://washingtonexaminer.com/tag/pentagon" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Pentagon</a> from terminating them after being dismissed on charges of insubordination.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Publisher Max Lederer, Editor-in-Chief Erik Slavin, and reporter Lara Korte filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asserting that their terminations, effective Friday, violated the <a href="https://washingtonexaminer.com/tag/first-amendment" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">First Amendment</a>.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Lawyers for the plaintiffs contend that Slavin and Korte were dismissed for advocating that <em>Stars and Stripes</em> should remain independent from the <a href="https://washingtonexaminer.com/tag/department-of-defense" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Department of Defense</a> and any political influence, while Lederer was terminated for not complying with the request to fire them, according to a news release from the plaintiffs' legal team.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The newspaper maintains <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/daily-on-defense/4697875/hegseths-war-on-critical-press-coverage-hits-venerable-stars-and-stripes/?utm_source=chatgpt.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">editorial independence</a> but is funded by the Pentagon.</p>