Jen Psaki
Role at the time: Host of The Briefing with Jen Psaki on MS NOW and former White House press secretary
Statement summary
MS NOW host Jen Psaki criticized the Pentagon's email asking Army commanders to nominate attendees for Hegseth's State of the Force address. She called it a focus on the wrong things in the middle of a war, described the requirements as "casting call requirements", and said the request showed Hegseth's priorities were misplaced.
“Way to focus in the middle of a war on things that really matter right now.”
The outlet's own upload of the segment. Jen Psaki reacts to the Wall Street Journal's report on the Pentagon's email asking Army commanders to nominate attendees for Hegseth's State of the Force address, and explains how the Army's waist-to-height ratio is calculated. Quotations transcribed from the segment audio.
Why we used this label
Psaki rejects the request as a misplaced focus in wartime and mocks the criteria as "casting call requirements", which condemns them rather than only describing them. The closest competing label, “Challenged the characterization”, loses because she judges the criteria on the merits and does not merely dispute a description of them.