Journalists at Defense News and Military Times announced they are unionizing and forming the Sightline Media Union. In response, the organizing committee has released the following statement:
“We, a significant majority of journalists at Sightline Media Group (Military Times, Defense News, Federal Times, and C4SRNet), this morning filed to form a union with the Washington-Baltimore News Guild. We look forward to working with management to achieve our goals, and we seek voluntary recognition of our union from Sightline Media Group. We have dedicated our careers to covering U.S. troops, their families, veterans and the policies and technology that affect them. We wish to continue serving our readers to provide fair and accurate journalism that both informs and entertains. That is why, for the first time in the decades since we’ve first published, we decided to unionize.
We, the Sightline Media Union, will collectively advocate for our colleagues and ensure we receive the compensation and treatment we deserve. We love our work: telling our readers’ stories, holding policy makers accountable and upholding the values of the First Amendment. We want our newsroom and colleagues to succeed. This, we believe, is how we guarantee our future.”