The Pentagon has secretly installed several conservative military veterans with large online followings in government roles, declining to disclose their assignments as they amplify Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s viewpoints and attack those who scrutinize the Trump administration, according to people familiar with the matter and corroborating material.
At least some of the influencers have been assigned to civilian roles that could lead to changes in policy, the people familiar with the matter said. Like others, they spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
Neither the Pentagon nor those involved have disclosed the government roles despite the Trump administration’s claims that they are running the most transparent Defense Department ever.
Those involved include Rob Maness, a retired Air Force colonel, and Kurt Schlichter, a retired Army colonel, people familiar with the matter said. Pentagon records reviewed by the Washington Post show that both have active official government email addresses as of this past week and are assigned to the office of Anthony Tata, the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness. The email addresses include a “.civ” suffix, meaning they are labeled as civilian employees, rather than as military personnel or contractors.
Both served for decades in uniform and, since retiring, have turned from the military to conservative commentary. Maness has more than 135,000 followers on X, while Schlichter has nearly 620,000.
Another retired Army colonel and influencer, Thomas Anderson, was listed in Pentagon records earlier this year with a “.civ” email address and assigned to Tata’s office, according to people familiar with the matter and records reviewed by the Post. An attorney, he writes online under the pen name Cynical Publius and has more than 323,000 followers on X. He was no longer listed in Pentagon records late this past week, the people familiar with the issue said.
The assignments for all three have not previously been reported. Questions have been raised online about influencers’ connections with the Pentagon, including in an article last week by the Bulwark.
Pentagon spokesperson Joel Valdez declined to comment to the Post about whether any of the three are drawing a taxpayer-funded salary, what roles they have, or how long those jobs are expected to last. Tata did not respond to a request for comment.
Maness and Schlichter did not respond to emails or other messages requesting comment. Anderson declined to comment in a short phone call.
The individuals are assigned as either “special government employees” or “highly qualified experts,” people familiar with the issue said. Schlichter appears in a government database with an “HQE” designation after his name, according to material reviewed by the Post.
SGEs are limited by law to working no more than 130 days in any 365-day period. Those with HQE status can work full or part time, with or without compensation, according to government guidance on the issue released in 2023. It was not clear what financial agreements were reached with Maness, Schlichter, and Anderson, and when each of their assignments began.
Tata’s team has taken on a number of culture-war issues, including scrutinizing war colleges for “woke” ideology and reviewing how the Biden administration adopted COVID vaccine mandates for U.S. troops.
Hegseth, a former Fox News personality and Army National Guard officer, has attempted to reshape the public discourse about Pentagon affairs. Last year, he imposed new restrictions on Pentagon press corps members that forced dozens of journalists out of the building and later introduced a new, primarily right-wing press corps to replace them.
The increased attention on the Pentagon’s influence efforts comes after another conservative influencer, Jennica Pounds, accused a State Department official this month on social media of attempting to entrap her into publishing government secrets. Pounds, writing under the pen name DataRepublican, posted text messages online that showed the official approached Pounds with documents to publish and tout as a journalistic scoop.
Sarah Rogers, the undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, later disclosed on social media that she was the official who had reached out to Pounds. Rogers posted the documents herself, saying it was not a “trap,” and Pounds later said that she regretted “making a public spectacle” and “pulling people I respect into the swirl.” Rogers has been nominated by President Donald Trump to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America and other government-funded media.
The dustup was followed by the Pentagon and Pounds disclosing that she works as a special government employee for the Defense Department. She posted on social media that she became an employee in July, after holding a credential as a journalist in Hegseth’s new Pentagon press corps until June. Pounds has said on social media that she applied for a Pentagon press pass and received it in April.
Pounds did not respond to a request for comment.
The disclosure has roiled social media, where some fellow influencers have defended Pounds’ work amid criticism that she should have disclosed she was working for the government.
Adam Kinzinger, a former Republican congressman and Air Force veteran, posted that it appears the Pentagon “is using your tax dollars to hire influencers on X to put out partisan talking points.”
“How many more people that are blue checkmarks on X that are putting out information on behalf of the federal government, and Donald Trump, and the Republican Party … are actually special government employees?” said Kinzinger.
Maness, Schlichter, and Anderson appeared on behalf of the Pentagon’s Senior Service College Task Force at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., in May, two people familiar with the visit said. The task force was organized in the spring with the goal of rooting out ideology deemed “toxic” or “woke,” Hegseth said in March.
The task force has completed its research and prepared a report that has not yet been released, one of the people familiar with the visit said.
After initial publication of this story, Anderson said on social media on Sunday night that he was asked to join the task force after he published an article in February recommending changes to the war colleges. Anderson said he was a special government employee through July 26 with work “exclusively limited” to the task force.
“At no time have I ever received any compensation of any kind from any government source of any kind for anything I write or have ever written on X or in any magazine or other source,” Anderson wrote.
While in Carlisle task force members met with students and professors over a number of days and asked questions about the performance of leaders like Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, one of the people familiar with the visit said. Some students were uncertain how candid they should be and whether there would be negative consequences if administration officials did not like the answers, this person said.
The other person familiar with the visit said the task force members had concerns about the syllabus for a class focused on how military officers communicate with Congress.
Maness retired from the Air Force in 2011 and has run unsuccessfully for a U.S. Senate seat in Louisiana. He is listed as the chairperson of GatorPAC, a political action committee that says on its website that it wants to “drain the swamp” in Washington and find more military veterans to run for office. The PAC’s website also includes videos of an online political commentary show starring Maness.
In an article published last month by the conservative Daily Caller, Maness argues that Hegseth’s team needs to root out “disloyal” career employees in the department and laments “careerists who treat the Pentagon as their permanent fiefdom.” That article cites his decades of military experience, but does not say whether he is a current Pentagon employee.
In an article published Wednesday on the website Campus Reform, Maness attacked a decision made by Army leaders to pull back efforts to toughen academic requirements for college students in Reserve Officers’ Training Corps programs. “Secretary Hegseth’s outrage is justified,” Maness wrote. The article likewise does not mention any government assignment.
Maness also had a letter to the editor published in the Post in July in which he defended Hegseth’s efforts to reduce the number of military officers who attend elite universities for fellowships. He describes himself there as a retired Air Force officer, but no government role is mentioned. A Post spokesperson said that Maness did not disclose any connection to the Pentagon before publication.
Schlichter is a columnist with the conservative site Townhall, writing and podcasting on politics, immigration, and military affairs. On Aug. 6, he published a column calling Trump a “hero for finally fighting back against Iran.”
“He could have waltzed into the midterms, dragging Republicans behind him toward success,” Schlichter wrote. “But he had the courage to do what was necessary to stop these bastards before they made it impossible to prevent them from getting a [nuclear] bomb.”
On social media, Schlichter posted a video earlier this month of Hegseth praising sailors aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, an aircraft carrier that has faced morale problems during a long deployment.
“We are,lucky to have @PeteHegseth,” Schlichter wrote on X on Aug. 14. He describes himself on X as a retired Army colonel, lawyer, and columnist, but does not disclose current Pentagon employment.
On social media, Anderson has been a frequent critic of journalists, fellow veterans, and others opposing the Trump administration and has defended Hegseth’s efforts to overhaul military affairs. Writing for the Federalist in April, he assessed that there is “a cancer in America’s military ranks, and it must be expunged before it’s too late.”
This past week, he repeatedly defended Pounds on X for serving as a special government employee as he also declined to answer questions from several people about whether he was an SGE employee, too.
“The law does not view such people the same as civil servants, and they are legally allowed to continue whatever other private endeavors they were undertaking,” Anderson wrote. “In many cases, they are prohibited from revealing their status because of the sensitive nature of their work.”
Another military influencer, John Konrad, also defended Pounds while noting he had discussions with the administration this spring about becoming a special government employee at the Pentagon. Konrad, a former member of the U.S. Merchant Marine and founder of the maritime website gCaptain, said that the Pentagon sought him out for a role and he later felt “ghosted.”
The Pentagon also brought on Jerry Dunleavy, a journalist with the conservative Just the News, to assist Hegseth’s team with an ongoing review of the fall of Afghanistan. The Pentagon disclosed Dunleavy’s involvement in May.
Dunleavy previously worked as an investigator for the GOP-led House Foreign Affairs Committee during an earlier investigation of the collapse in Kabul and quit in protest, saying the committee had not gone far enough.
