The Trump administration is calling out reporters by name as it seeks to push its narrative about U.S. strikes on Iran, seeking to put the media on defense while stifling any talk about intelligence reports that fall short of saying Tehran’s nuclear capabilities were obliterated.

The attacks are targeting a broad swath of the press that includes specific reporters at cable news outlets as different as CNN and Fox News.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News personality himself, from a Pentagon podium Thursday morning said “Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst” as part of a broad attack on the media.

He was singling out Jennifer Griffin, a respected defense reporter who asked if the department was certain that all of Iran’s highly enriched uranium was at the Fordow nuclear facility.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt from her own podium later Thursday singled out CNN reporter Natasha Bertrand, saying she had written “a lie from the intelligence community to seek a narrative she wanted to prove.”

The personal attacks are unusual and underscore the administration’s determination to put the media on defense and win a public relations air war over success of the attacks on Iran.

The administration is confident of its success because it has worked before — and because of general distrust of the media.

“These people are never going to lose any polling points attacking the media, we know that for sure,” one national political reporter told The Hill on Thursday. “But this is getting pretty personal and feels like it’s getting more intense each day.”

Trump also called out Bertrand by name Wednesday, demanding that the

© The Hill