WASHINGTON (AP) — Citing an internal misinterpretation of a change in policy, the U.S. Navy is backing away from statements that it would begin to restrict press and public access to sailors’ service histories — information that has been freely offered for decades. “The Navy continues to fulfill service record requests under our longstanding, standard disclosure procedures,” the Navy said in a statement hours after The Associated Press reported a policy change that meant sailor biographies would be off limits to the press.
Candice Tresch, a spokeswoman for the chief of Naval personnel, told the AP that the service would “no longer provide public, on-demand access to Sailor biographies, unless the subject of the request is a public figure or extenuating circumstances exist.” She explained the policy in the wake of the Navy’s denial of a request by The Associated Press for a specific sailor’s biography. A Navy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive situation, said Thursday afternoon that Tresch’s statement was the result of a misinterpretation of a recently released Navy policy that has now been resolved. There was confusion over the meaning of the policy Last week, the Navy’s top spokesman, Rear Admiral John Robinson, released a policy message that mandated the sea service remove all public-facing information about its commanding officers.
It was this policy that the Navy official now says was misinterpreted — and that the actual policy of the Navy on disclosing sailor biographies never actually changed. Tresch said the Navy’s personnel office decided to expand the policy to deny access to any currently serving sailor’s service information, in the interest of equality. She said that while they would still confirm whether someone is or previously was a sailor, no other details would be offered until the undefined threat had passed.
Robinson’s office did not respond to emails on both Tuesday and Wednesday with questions about how the Chief of Naval Personnel’s office was interpreting Robinson’s policy. But in a statement posted Thursday on X, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said there had been no change in the Navy’s policy on releasing service records for sailors. He said it merely concerned leadership biographies.
“There has been NO change to the Navy’s policies governing the release of service records,” Parnell…
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