can visitors tour the pentagon

Pentagon Tours: Reservations, Parking, and Visiting Tips

The Pentagon, the headquarters of the Department of Defense, is one of the world's largest office buildings with about 6,500,000 sq ft. providing office space and amenities for more than 23,000 employees, both military and civilian. The building has five sides, five floors above ground, two basement levels, and a total of 17.5 miles of corridors. Guided tours are given by military personnel and are available by reservation only. Pentagon tours last for approximately one hour and provide an overview of the mission of the Department of Defense and the four branches of the military: Navy, Air Force, Army, and Marine Corps.

The outdoor Pentagon Memorial that commemorates the 9/11 attacks is open to the public with no reservations required. It is not included in the guided tour.

Arranging a Tour

To take a guided tour of the Pentagon, you must make a reservation in advance . Tours are conducted Monday through Thursday from 10 am to 3 pm and Fridays between 12 pm and 4 pm. Reservations must be booked from 14 to 90 days in advance. U.S. citizens can reserve a tour online, but foreign residents must contact their embassy to reserve a tour. All visitors must pass through a security scanning device and no photography will be allowed on the tour. You must arrive at least 15 minutes before your scheduled tour and bring along your confirmed reservation letter and photo identification.

Getting to the Pentagon

The Pentagon is located off of I-395 on the Virginia side of the Potomac River. The best way to get to the Pentagon is by Metrorail and the Visitor Center is located next to the Pentagon Metro Station.

There is no public parking at the Pentagon, but visitors may park at the Pentagon City Mall and walk to the entrance through a pedestrian tunnel. If you are not familiar with the area, it can be confusing, so be sure to leave plenty of time to find your way to the Visitor Center.

The tunnel is located across the street from Macy’s on the far side of the Reserved Parking Lot. Once through the tunnel, walk to the right until you see signs for the Metro Station and the Visitor Center. (When leaving, note that the tunnel is at the far end of parking Lane 7).

Major Points of Interest on the Pentagon Tour

The Pentagon is a building with a long and significant history with many points of interest you won't find anywhere else in Washington DC.

• The Hall of Heroes: includes the names of all the recipients of the Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration awarded by the United States government.
• Overlord Embroidery: 34 tapestries created by Sandra Lawrence depict the story of the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944.
• Faces of the Fallen Memorial: an exhibit features individual portraits in honor of the service men and women killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.
• POW-MIA Corridor: the exhibit recognizes United States military personnel taken as prisoners of war (POWs) or listed as missing in action (MIA).
• Soldiers and Signers of the Constitution Corridor: numerous paintings in this corridor commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence and portray the founding fathers of our nation.
• 9/11 Memorial and Chapel: commemorates those killed in the terrorist attack at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. The indoor memorial displays the names of the 184 victims. The chapel provides space for prayer and remembrance.
• 9/11 Memorial Quilts: project initiated by Jeannie Ammermann to honor those killed on September 11, 2001 evolved into a multi-quilt project that drew volunteer quilters from all parts of the U.S.
• Pentagon Center Courtyard: 5.5 acres of outdoor space in the interior of the building includes food concessions and casual seating areas.

Visiting Tips

As you get ready for your tour, here are some tips to make sure the experience goes as smoothly as possible and you get the most out of it.

• Although, the Pentagon recommends you arrive 15 minutes before your tour, plan to arrive 30 minutes early to allow time to go through security.
• The best time to take the tour is mid-day when transportation to the Pentagon is less congested.
• The tour includes walking a distance of about one and a half miles through the Pentagon corridors and staircases, so wear comfortable clothing and shoes.
• Be sure to visit the Pentagon Memorial after your guided tour of the Pentagon. It won't be included in your tour.
• Enjoy a casual lunch at the Pentagon City Mall before or after your tour. The mall has one of the nicest food courts in the area and more than 170 specialty shops.

20 Best Things to Do in Washington, D.C.

23 Top Free Things to Do in Washington, DC

The 26 Best Washington, D.C. Monuments and Memorials

48 Hours in Lower Manhattan: The Perfect Itinerary

The 16 Best Things to Do in Arlington, Virginia

Washington DC Old Town Trolley Tours: Hop on Hop off

Naval Academy Tours in Annapolis, MD

What to See and Do on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

Take a Walking Tour of Downtown Phoenix

12 Best Things to Do in Washington, DC, With Toddlers

The Paris Catacombs: Creepy, Interesting, or Both?

13 Top New York City Attractions

Chateau de Vincennes: The Complete Guide

Best 14 Washington, D.C. Museums

Two Days in Washington DC: A 48 Hour Itinerary

Arlington National Cemetery: What to See and Do

Search Results

We are sorry, no results were found for your search .

Ultimate Guide to the Pentagon

One of the largest office buildings in the world, the Pentagon serves as the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense. A symbol of American military strength, the concrete and steel building is recognized around the world. Nearly 30,000 military and civilian personnel work inside the Pentagon each day. Covering approximately 6.5 million square feet, the building contains a food court and mini-shopping mall. Because of its size, the Pentagon has six ZIP codes. It uses the place identifier for Washington, DC even though the five-sided building is actually located in Arlington, Virginia .

The Building

The famous edifice has five rings, five floors above ground and two floors below ground. There are almost 18 miles of corridors. Despite its size, the layout of the hallways and interconnecting walkways enables an individual to reach any office in less than seven minutes. The rings are labeled “A” through “E” from the interior courtyard to the outside. Because the E-ring is the only one with exterior views, it is the location for offices of the most senior officials. The five-acre courtyard park is nicknamed Ground Zero. The term was inspired by the belief that the park would be a primary target for Soviet nuclear missiles during the Cold War. The Pentagon is twice the size of the Merchandise Mart in Chicago. The U.S. Capitol would fit in just one of the building’s five wings.

The Northern Mall Terrace façade features a portico that leads to a 600-foot-long terrace that is used for various official ceremonies. The portico of the River Entrance façade overlooks a lagoon and a landing point. The dock was once used by duty boats that transported service members across the Potomac River to Bolling Air Force Base. The main visitor entrance, the Concourse Entrance façade, is the location of the Pentagon Metro stop. The other two facades are known as the Helipad and South Parking entrances. The site of numerous anti-war protests over the years, the Pentagon was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1989.

History of the Pentagon

During World War I, the War Department was housed in a variety of permanent and temporary buildings in and around Washington, DC. In the late 1930s, a new headquarters was constructed in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood. This building soon proved inadequate. It is currently used by the State Department. With the rapid expansion of the War Department during World War II, Secretary of War Henry Stimson lobbied President Franklin Roosevelt for a large permanent office building. In 1941, it was agreed that a new large office building would be constructed in Arlington. The original site selected for construction was the pentagon-shaped Arlington Farms, a temporary housing complex for female civil servants operated by the Department of Agriculture.

When concerns arose that the new building might obstruct views of Washington, DC from Arlington National Cemetery, the construction site was moved to the former Hoover Field Airport. To keep costs down, the building’s pentagon-shape design plans were retained. The configuration was reminiscent of the star-shaped forts built during the gunpowder age. To reduce the amount of steel used, architects incorporated ramps rather than elevators in the building. Steel was in short supply and needed for the war effort. The exterior façade is adorned with Indiana limestone. Architectural, design and construction work were accomplished simultaneously, and the building was constructed in sections to save time. Colonel Leslie Groves who later oversaw the Manhattan Project as a general officer, supervised the work on the Pentagon. The building cost slightly more than $31.1 million to complete in 1943.

During construction, segregation laws in Virginia required separate rest room facilities for blacks and whites. As a result, the Pentagon has a higher ratio of rest rooms for its occupants than most similar size office buildings. It was the only public building in Arlington with segregated rest rooms until 1965. On Sept. 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 77 struck the western side of the Pentagon killing 189 people. Although approximately one-third of the building was damaged, the repairs were completed by the anniversary of the attack. The repairs were incorporated into a larger ongoing renovation program that was completed in 2011, which brought the Pentagon up to standards required for modern office buildings.

Must See Exhibits

More than 100,000 people visit the Pentagon each year. A 60-minute guided tour highlights the history of the building and the Department of Defense. Covering approximately 1.5 miles, the guided tour includes the Hall of Heroes, which honors America’s Medal of Honor recipients, as well as an exhibit dedicated to prisoners of war and those missing in action. You will also see numerous portraits of the country’s founding fathers and a painting depicting the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

While at the Pentagon, guests can also see the National 9-11 Pentagon Memorial. Situated on the west side of the building, the memorial is dedicated to those who lost their lives that fateful day. The 2-acre park features illuminated benches engraved with the names of the victims, memorial pools and a wall ranging from 3 inches to 71 inches in height to represent the ages of the youngest and oldest victims. There are also 85 paperbark maple trees. Open seven days a week, it is the only place on the Pentagon grounds where photography is permitted.

There is also a burial marker in nearby Arlington National Cemetery . It marks the grave of the 184 victims of the attack on the Pentagon. Located in Section 64, the five-sided granite marker lists the names of those who perished on the plane and inside the Pentagon.

The Pentagon parking lots are used as the staging point for a number of annual events. These include Rolling Thunder, a gathering of motorcycle enthusiasts showing support for America’s prisoners of war and missing in action, the Army Ten-Miler and the Marine Corps Marathon.

Know Before You Go

You must make reservations for the guided tour at least 14 but not more than 90 days in advance. Tours are offered Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. except on federal holidays. Visitors 18 and older require a valid government-issued photo ID. The tour starts at the visitor center just to the left, inside the Pentagon Metro entrance. Arrive at least an hour before your scheduled tour to pass through security. The Metro stop is on the Blue and Yellow lines. The Pentagon does not have public parking.

Nearby Attractions

Arlington National Cemetery is the location for the Tomb of the Unknowns and the gravesite of President John F. Kennedy along with numerous other monuments and memorials. It is also the burial ground for many famous Americans and war heroes, including Audie Murphy, Abner Doubleday and Joe Louis. There are monuments and memorials to the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia as well as Women in the Military Service, Pan Am Flight 103 and Spanish American War Nurses.

Formerly known as Columbia Island, Lady Bird Johnson Park includes scenic walking and driving paths, colorful plantings and blooming trees that provide vivid Spring and Fall foliage. There are overlooks and picnic areas as well. The park also features the Lyndon Baines Johnson Memorial Grove and the Navy and Marine Memorial. The Mount Vernon Trail passes through the park.

24 hours a day, 7 days a week

• Explore the Memorial
• About the Memorial
• Interactive Map
• Meet the Heroes
• Pentagon Memorial Construction Timeline
• Remembering the Heroes
• Visitor FAQ
• Visitor Resources

The countdown has expired.

• About the VEC
• Support the VEC
• VEC Design Team
• 9/11 Experiences
• 9/11 Timeline
• Events of 9/11
• Share Your Story
• Special Events at the Memorial
• Board of Directors
• Financial Statements

Sign Up for Updates

Sorry to interrupt, but we need your help! Today, we ask you to give just $3 to help the Memorial achieve its goal of building a Visitor Education Center so future generations never forget the 184 lives lost at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.

Powered by Juicer

Questions about the pentagon memorial.

• Who designed the Pentagon Memorial? Keith Kasemen and Julie Beckman
• How was the final design selected? A worldwide competition. There was a jury made up of highly respected design professionals, family members, and Washington dignitaries, including two former Secretaries of Defense. The winners were announced March 3, 2003.
• When was the ground breaking? June 15, 2006
• When was the Memorial dedicated? September 11, 2008
• What is the cost of the Memorial? The Memorial cost $22 million to construct. The Pentagon Memorial Fund is continuing to raise money for a preservation endowment and educational outreach opportunities.
• What is the size of the Pentagon Memorial? Approximately two acres
• Is there handicapped parking? Where? There are five parking spaces for automobiles for people with disabilities available in Lane 1 of the Pentagon South Parking lot, adjacent to the Memorial Park. This parking is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. All vehicles utilizing this parking shall display a valid disabled parking permit issued by the state in which the vehicle is registered.
• Where can visitors park? Private Vehicle: Parking on the Pentagon Reservation is for AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. Private vehicles may off load and pick up passengers at the North Rotary Road Kiss and Drop points, but they must move on and cannot park or stand at these locations. Parking regulations are strictly enforced at the Pentagon.Metered parking is available on the streets of Crystal City and Pentagon City and for a fee in the Fashion Center at Pentagon City Mall.Evenings, Saturday, Sunday & Holidays: The Hayes Street Parking lot is available on weekdays from 5:00 pm – 7:00 am, and all day on Saturday, Sunday and holidays (NOTE: OVERNIGHT PARKING IS PROHIBITED). There is no tour bus parking and idling on the Pentagon Reservation. Tour bus pick-up/drop off is located at the Hayes Street Lot.
• How do I get to the Memorial? Public Access to the Pentagon Memorial: The Memorial is accessible to the general public by Metro, private vehicle, and bus. However, due to parking constraints, the public is urged to use Metro as the primary means to come to the Pentagon and the Pentagon Memorial. Metro:  The Blue and Yellow lines of Metro serve the Pentagon from the Pentagon Metro stop. There are also many bus routes that stop at the Pentagon Metro Transit Center. From there, you may walk to the Pentagon Memorial. You may also use the Pentagon City Metro stop and walk to the Pentagon Memorial. The Arlington Cemetery Metro Stop may be another option for tourists wishing to visit the September 11 group marker at the cemetery and the Pentagon Memorial.
• When is the Memorial open? The Pentagon Memorial is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
• Are there restrooms available for visitors? Yes. The restrooms are open daily from 7:00 am – 10:00 pm.
• Can I leave a memento at the Memorial? Yes
• Can I eat or drink in the Pentagon Memorial? Due to sanitation concerns and vermin control, eating and drinking (except for water) in the Pentagon Memorial is not allowed.
• Can I bring my dog (pet)? Pets and other animals are not authorized on the Pentagon Reservation or inside the Memorial. Seeing-eye dogs, guide dogs, police working dogs, etc. are authorized entry while performing their intended service. Owners and handlers are asked to pick up after their animals.
• Can I take pictures at the Memorial? Photography is permitted within the Pentagon Memorial. However, consistent with current policy (32 CFR 234), photography is restricted at all other locations on the Reservation (i.e. pedestrian and vehicular pathways; drop-off areas).
• Can I smoke inside the Memorial? In order to minimize debris that may interfere with proper operation of the Memorial, we ask that visitors not smoke in the Memorial or the Gateway.
• Can tour groups go to the Pentagon Memorial? Yes
• Who is responsible for maintaining (picking up trash, cleaning the benches, etc.) the Memorial? Washington Headquarters Services (WHS) manages the maintenance of the Memorial.  The Pentagon Force Protection Agency (PFPA) provides security.

Questions About The Pentagon Building

• When was the Pentagon constructed? How long did it take to build? Construction began on September 11, 1941 and was completed in the remarkably short time of sixteen months on January 15, 1943. The building rests on 41,492 concrete columns. The shortages of materials required for war production raised many design and construction problems. The use of reinforced concrete in lieu of formed steel for the building made possible a saving of 43,000 tons of steel, more than enough to build a battleship. The use of concrete ramps rather than elevators further reduced steel requirements. Drainage pipes were concrete, ducts were fiber, and interior doors were wood.
• How much did it cost to build the Pentagon? The original estimated cost of construction was $35,000,000.  The approximate actual cost was $86,000,000.
• What is the Pentagon? Headquarters of the Department of Defense, the Pentagon is the world's largest low-rise office building.
• Why was the Pentagon a terrorist target? Since World War II, the Pentagon has stood as a symbol of American power and influence to the nation and the world. By September 11, 2001, it had been the command center of the nation’s military establishment for more than half a century. In some regions of the world, particularly in the Middle East, a U.S. military presence and perceived power would have made the Pentagon an object of fear and hatred, and a likely target of attack by terrorist enemies.
• What was the significance of the Pentagon’s renovation project on the area that the plane hit? In 1990, Congress authorized a complete overhaul of the Pentagon. Upgrading security stood high on the list for the reconstruction and renovation of the building, which began in 1998 with Wedge 1. By September 2001, Wedge 1 had been largely reoccupied and work was under way on adjacent Wedge 2, which had been cleared of all but about 700 occupants. On September 11, the offices in or near the impact point were not completely occupied, either awaiting new tenants in Wedge 1 or mostly vacated in preparation for renovation in Wedge 2. Had the aircraft hit fully-occupied unrenovated Wedge 5, several hundred yards to the right, the toll of dead and injured, as well as structural damage, would have been much greater.
• How did the structure of the Pentagon play a role on September 11? Although never designed to offer the protection of a bunker, the building's steel-reinforced concrete and brick construction protected most employees in Wedges 1 and 2 from fires and explosions, which saved their lives. Moreover, the rigidity of the Pentagon’s façade caused some of the fuel in the wings to detonate on impact, diminishing the inside destruction. The lighter structure and largely glass facade of the World Trade Center buildings presented much less impact resistance.
• Where is the Pentagon Memorial located? The Pentagon Memorial is located at 1 Rotary Road on the Pentagon Reservation in Arlington, Virginia. The mailing address is: Pentagon Memorial ATTN: Pentagon Building Management Office Room 2E1040, Pentagon Washington, DC 20301-1155
• How big is the Pentagon? The Pentagon is a five-sided, five-story (plus two basements) building containing a large central courtyard and five concentric rings of offices. It is twice the size of the Merchandise Mart in Chicago, and has three times the floor space of the Empire State Building in New York. The U.S. Capitol building could fit into any one of the five wedge-shaped sections. Despite 17 1/2 miles of corridors, it takes only seven minutes to walk between any two points in the building.
• How many people work at the Pentagon? There are approximately 24,000 employees, both military and civilian.
• Where are the interior memorial and chapel located? They are located at the end of Corridor 4 on the first floor, across from the Pentagon Memorial.
• How can I arrange a tour of the Pentagon or visit the interior memorial and chapel? All guided tours of the Pentagon are free and are available to schools, educational organizations and other select groups by reservation only. Tours are conducted Monday through Friday during normal working hours. Tours are not conducted on weekends or federal holidays. Groups interested in touring the Pentagon should contact the Pentagon Tour Office at 703-697-1776. Additional information can be found on the Internet at http://pentagon.afis.osd.mil/
• How long did it take to rebuild the damaged area? The Pentagon Renovation and Construction Program Office (PENREN) began the Phoenix Project on October 18, 2001, so named because of its representation of the mythical bird rising from the ashes. Reducing the schedule of the original Wedge 1 renovation, the impacted portions of the Pentagon were demolished, rebuilt, and occupied in less than one year. The offices directly above the point of impact were occupied on August 15, 2002, 28 days ahead of schedule.

Questions About The General Area

• Where is the Pentagon victim’s marker in Arlington Cemetery? It is located in Section 64, near the Arlington Cemetery Columbarium.
• How do I get to Arlington National Cemetery? Driving: About 2.5 miles away Take ramp onto I-395 South Take exit 8B to merge onto VA-110 North toward I-66 Take the exist toward Washington Turn left at Memorial Drive/ The Esplanade
• How do I get to the Air Force Memorial? Driving: About 2.4 miles away Take ramp onto VA-27 South Exit onto Columbia Pike / VA-244 Destination will be on the right
• How do I get to Pentagon City Mall / Crystal City? Driving: About 1.7 miles away Take VA-110 South Take the I-395/US-1 exit Slight right at Army Navy Drive Turn left at S Hayes Stret Destination will be on the right Pentagon City Mall 1100 S Hayes St Arlington, VA 22202Metro: From Washington, D.C., take the Blue line toward Franconia-Springfield OR the Yellow line toward Huntington Pentagon City is one metro stop from the Pentagon, and Crystal City is two stops from the Pentagon
• Where is the Arlington County bike path? Next to the Pentagon Memorial Gateway

David B Gleason

Can I Tour the Pentagon?

The pentagon memorial is open to all visitors, and public tours inside the pentagon are available to us citizens with advance reservation..

Yes, but public tours inside the Pentagon are available to US citizens only with advance reservations. The Pentagon Memorial is open to all visitors.

How to tour the Pentagon

The Pentagon, located just outside Washington, DC in Arlington, Va., is the headquarters for the United States Department of Defense. It is open for official tours through the  Pentagon Tours program .

Pentagon tours must be reserved at least 14 days in advance and no more than 90 days in advance. Tours are conducted Tuesdays and Thursdays (excluding federal holidays) at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Tours fill up quickly and it is highly recommended that you book well in advance of your visit. You can make a tour request online . International visitors must request a tour through their home country’s embassy.

Individuals who have a Pentagon badge and escort privileges are permitted to give a self-guided tours to friends or family. If you are assigned to the Pentagon or if you are visiting a Pentagon staff member, contact the Pentagon Force Protection Agency at (703) 697-1001 to determine escort status.

Nighttime at the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial in Virginia

Touring the Pentagon

Tours are 60 minutes and cover about 1.5 miles inside the Pentagon, which is one of the largest office buildings in the world. Tours include the history of the four branches of the military and the opportunity to see the indoor memorial near the Sept. 11 crash site and the Sept. 11 Memorial chapel, as well as the Hall of Heroes (featuring the names of all the Medal of Honor recipients) and a number of other military displays.

@daily__ary

Parking, security and accessibility

There is no public parking at The Pentagon. The Pentagon can be reached via its own dedicated Metro stop on the Blue and Yellow lines or you may choose to park at Pentagon City Mall and make the five-minute walk to the Pentagon via pedestrian tunnel. Once you’ve arrived, check in at the Pentagon Tours window near the Metro entrance.

Visitors must check-in at least 60 minutes prior to their scheduled tour to allow time for security. You will be asked to present your tour confirmation email and photo ID. All visitors will go through security scanners. All purses are subject to search. Large bags, including backpacks, shopping bags and camera bags are NOT permitted on the tour. Cell phone, cameras, recording devices and other electronic devices cannot be used on the tour and no photography is permitted inside the building.

Ramps are available for visitors with disabilities. Tour visitors in wheelchairs must bring someone who can assist them on the tour.  A signer will be added to tours to assist hearing impaired visitors provided that two weeks' notice is given. Special tours for visually impaired visitors can also be arranged with two weeks' notice.

There are so many great tours and sightseeing opportunities in Washington, DC. Discover  your next tour adventure .

More About DC

You may also like..

9 Things to See & Do In Virginia

8 Exciting Summer Activities in the Capital Region

How Can I Tour the Monuments & Memorials in Washington, DC?

This website uses cookies to improve your browsing experience and analyze the use of the website. Learn More

Reserve Your Spot with Confidence! Full Refunds with 24 Hrs Notice. Reschedule at any point, even after tour, if space allows!

Pentagon Guided Tours

How to visit the pentagon on a guided tour, with tips on how to get here, where to park, and other nearby attractions..

As the headquarters of the Department of Defense for the United States, you may not think the building is open to the public.

However, with advance planning and some background checks, you can take a Pentagon Tour for you and your family.

The tour itself is FREE but advanced reservations are required.

It is 60 minutes long and you must stay with the group the entire time.

You'll find that the guide almost always walks backward for the entire tour (so he or she can keep his eyes on you!).

• How to Get Tickets
• Plan Your Visit

Tour Highlights

• Pentagon Memorial

How to Get a Pentagon Tour

Pentagon Tours must be requested in advance! You may request tickets from 14 days up to 90 days prior to the tour. .  

Tours are conducted for U.S. Citizens only on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10:00 am and 1:00 pm.

The tours are free of charge and last roughly an hour.

To submit your reservation request, you will need to provide the total number of persons, your requested date and start time, and the name and phone number of the person requesting the tour.

Reserve Pentagon tours here .

If you know someone who works at the Pentagon and they have a Pentagon badge, you can take a self-guided tour of the Pentagon with them.

How to Get to the Pentagon

The Pentagon is located in Arlington VA, across the Potomac River from downtown Washington, DC, and just to the south of Arlington National Cemetery.

( NOTE: Technically, the Pentagon is located within the District of Columbia)

We recommend using this link for directions to the Pentagon from anywhere in the DC area.

The best way to reach the Pentagon is by Metro (Washington DC's subway).

The Pentagon Metro Station services both the blue and yellow lines of the DC Metro.

The security check-in for Pentagon Tours is adjacent to the Metro station exit at the Pentagon Visitor Center.  

Be sure to read our post on how to use the DC Metro system .

There are also many bus lines that service the building. 

There is no public parking at the Pentagon. We highly recommend using public transportation.

If you need to drive, you can find cheap parking at a garage at 900 Army Navy Dr.

You can pay ahead of time online for a guaranteed space in this garage with SpotHero .

It is a 10-15 minute walk to the Pentagon by crossing through the parking lot and underneath the interstate (follow signs to the Pentagon Memorial to enter the access tunnel to get to the Pentagon Parking Lot).  

Click here for directions from the parking garage at the Pentagon City Mall to the Pentagon.

*Be sure you always stay in the crosswalk and designated sidewalks as many areas of the grounds are secure!*

Security Check-in at the Pentagon

All tours begin and end at the security checkpoint just outside the Pentagon Metro entrance.

It is well-signed and the guards are very friendly in assisting you to find the correct entrance.  

What time should you arrive for the Pentagon tour?

Arrive 60 minutes prior to your scheduled time to allow for the entire group to pass through security.

What ID do you need for the Pentagon tour?

You will need to bring with you a copy of the confirmation of your tour.

Additionally, anyone in your party who is 18 years or older will need one form of proper identification which must be current and contain a photograph.

Proper forms of ID include the following:

• U.S. Passport
• U.S. Passport Card
• Driver's license or identification card issued by a State or outlying possession of the United States provided it contains a photograph and meets the REAL ID standards
• An identification card issued by Federal, State, or local government agencies, provided it contains a photograph
• U.S. Government PIV Card (CAC for DoD Personnel)
• DoD Affiliated Identification Cards (Retirees, Dependents, and Inactive Reservists)
• Native American Tribal Document
• U.S. Border Crossing Card
• Permanent Resident Card or Alien Registration Receipt Card (INS Form I-551 or I-551)
• Foreign passport with a temporary (I-551) stamp or temporary (I-551) printed notation on a machine-readable immigrant visa
• Foreign passport

Visitors 17 years of age or younger who are accompanied by an adult do not need identification.

Prohibited Items

• Large bags such as backpacks, camera bags, and suitcases are not allowed.
• No weapons or sharp objects permitted
• All purses are subject to search but are allowed
• Small electronic devices like cell phones, tablets, GPS devices, storage devices like flash drives, laptops, and smartwatches are not allowed.
• Photography is prohibited on Pentagon property, both inside and outside the building (with the exception of the Pentagon Memorial ).

There are no storage lockers, so be sure not to arrive with any of the prohibited items. Read the full list of prohibited items .

There is a small box where you can store small devices like phones but laptops will not fit.

Checking in for Pentagon Tours:

Once you are through the security scanners, you still have to check in! After you clear security turn left and find the Pentagon Tour Window to check in your group.

Groups that do not check in at the tour window forfeit their tour.

Pentagon Visitor Center

You will wait for your tour at the Pentagon Visitors Center.

Visitors are not permitted back into the visitors center once the tour has finished so now would be the time to visit the gift shop and restrooms.

Here you can take photos at the only place photos are permitted inside the building - at the replica Press Briefing Room podium.

Food is not permitted while on tour and the tour guide will not pause the tour for any guest to eat.

You may coordinate with Pentagon personnel who will escort you to an area where your group may eat before or after the tour.

All tours will cover the history and interesting facts pertaining to four branches of the military (Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps).

You may also have the opportunity to visit the indoor September 11th memorial adjacent to the crash site as well as the 9/11 Memorial Chapel.

Some tours will also visit the Hall of Heroes where all of the names of the recipients of the Medal of Honor are listed as well as an actual Medal of Honor medallion.

Tour itineraries and commentary topics are subject to change at any time.

There are no stops when you are on the tour and the tour is almost always in a walking motion.

The Pentagon Memorial

After your tour, we encourage you to walk around the building following signs to the National September 11th Pentagon Memorial to visit this thought-provoking site before you exit the grounds.

The memorial, which honors the 184 victims who died in the Pentagon or on American Airlines flight 77, is approximately 15 minutes by foot from the Pentagon Metro station where you will exit the building after the tour.

Keep in mind that photos are prohibited until you arrive at the memorial.

The memorial is open 24 hours a day and bathrooms are present though sporadically they are not open.  

Read more about the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial.

Related Posts:

• How to Get White House Tickets
• How to Tour the U.S. Capitol Building
• Can I tour the FBI Building?

Choose a Destination... I want them all PLUS general travel tips. Amsterdam Berlin Boston Charleston Chicago Dubai Lisbon London Los Angeles Miami Nashville New York City New Orleans Paris Philadelphia Prague Rome San Francisco Washington DC

About The Author

Canden Arciniega

North america, united kingdom & ireland, middle east & india, asia & oceania.

• Columbia Pike
• Crystal City
• Langston Boulevard
• Pentagon City
• Shirlington
• Annual Events
• Submit Your Event
• Memorials & Museums
• Arts & Culture
• Health & Fitness
• Coffee Shops
• Farmers Markets
• Food Trucks
• Where To Stay
• Transportation
• Visitor Services
• Visitors Guide
• Newsletter Sign-Up
• Weather & Average Temperatures
• Sustainability
• Accessibility
• Deals & Packages
• Why Arlington?
• Special Event Venues
• Meeting & Group Services
• Meeting Planners Guide
• Meetings Newsletter Sign-Up
• Submit an RFP
• Travel Trade

See the Pentagon on a Guided Tour

​Did you know the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense opens its doors to the public?

The Pentagon, America’s symbol of military strength located in Arlington, is the world’s largest low-rise office building. With advance planning and some background checks, you can receive a 1.49 mile walking tour of the massive building that is like a self-contained city.

The Pentagon Tours program lets more than 100,000 visitors annually see the corridors and hallway displays. Tour guides are active duty personnel from the National Capital Region’s military ceremonial units, and it’s no easy job: a guide walks backwards the whole time while presenting 33 pages of tour info memorized verbatim.

For tourists, it’s a great way to get your steps on a vacation to the capital area. Find out about all the shops and services available to Pentagon employees and be dazzled by the various gifts to buy at the Fort America gift shop, from challenge coins to Pentagon apparel.

Visitors get to see a memorial quilt honoring the victims of the terrorist attack in 2001. After a hijacked airliner hit the building on Sept. 11, 2001, it took a year to rebuild the damage to the outer rings of the building. Following a visit inside the Pentagon, see the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial , and you’ll have a chance to contemplate, read excerpts on the individual lives and also sign a memory book.

To sign up for the 60-minute Pentagon building tour, reservations can be requested at the Pentagon website 14 to 90 days in advance. Tours run from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and from noon to 4 p.m. Friday, not weekends and federal holidays.

At least one form of current photo identification is required for visitors over age 18 such as a U.S. Passport, U.S. Passport Card, driver’s license meeting REAL ID standards, photo ID issued by federal, state or local government, Native American Tribal Document, U.S. Border Crossing Card, Permanent Resident Card or Alien Registration Receipt Card, foreign passport or a foreign passport with a temporary stamp or temporary printed notation on a machine readable immigrant visa. Leave your camera in your bag because you are not allowed to take photographs or use electronic devices during the tour. Weapons and large bags are prohibited.

Planning a capital visit? Book now!

Related Stories

Only-in-Arlington Experiences

Make lasting memories for your attendees with these one-of-a-kind Arlington group activities.

3 Ways to Inspire Attendance at Your Arlington Event

You’ve made an excellent destination selection! Now let us help you promote your meeting in Arlington, Virginia, next door to…

Army Navy Dr & Fern St Arlington, VA 20301 (703) 697-1776 Find A Room

The Pentagon Army Navy Dr & Fern St Arlington, VA 20301

1 Rotary Road Arlington, VA 22202 (202) 741-1004

The National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial 1 Rotary Road Arlington, VA 22202

This site uses cookies to provide you with an optimized experience. Learn More

Experience Builder

Quick search, location map.

clock This article was published more than  5 years ago

A Pentagon tour? About as exciting as visiting an old shopping mall.

Like many a daydreaming Green Line rider, I’m forced to visit the Pentagon Metro stop a few times a month. Only when sunlight streams through the windows of the Yellow Line train I’ve boarded by accident do I realize my mistake. “Shoot!” I say, often out loud. “Not again!”

Last week, for the first time, I got off at that stop on purpose for a Pentagon tour. Anyone can sign up online for a tour, though it takes a month to process a request. Following the Pentagon website’s advice, I arrived an hour before my tour’s start time to clear security. Going through the airport-style scanners took me only about five minutes, so I spent the rest of that time perusing the Pentagon visitor center.

A lobby-like area, the visitor center includes five large kiosks, one for each branch of the U.S. military. Though they once promoted the missions of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard and Air Force, the kiosks currently serve as a showcase for broken screens — I counted 10 in all. I also found two working screens showing unnarrated footage of soldiers and airplanes, and one broadcasting someone’s Windows desktop background.

Other points of interest in the visitor center include a replica Department of Defense podium where tourists can pretend to give press briefings, and signs in six languages explaining that the tour is offered only in English and that you may not bring a translator or even have a side conversation in a foreign tongue. (The Pentagon website disagrees with these signs, saying a tour group can bring along an approved translator.)

As the tour began, a young, uniformed soldier piled rules on top of rules. “Photos and videos are strictly prohibited,” he said. In fact, if we were caught with our phones out, “that might be the last time you see them.”

Had I accidentally signed up for boot camp? It felt that way, especially when two uniformed military members bookended my group and marched us out of the visitor center in tight formation.

As we entered the main building and passed beneath a “Welcome to the Pentagon” sign, I felt a shiver of excitement. This was the real, actual Pentagon! Like in the movies! That thrill, however, evaporated the moment we stepped inside.

“Did everyone picture the Pentagon looking like this inside their head?” said our guide. “Me either.”

I know I was surprised. The Defense Department, currently burning through a $700 billion budget, has a headquarters that looks, in part, like a dated shopping mall. It’s a suspicious mismatch, like a family living in a dilapidated house to avoid attracting attention to their expensive jewelry or massive nuclear arsenal.

With 26,000 employees, the Pentagon is like a small city, with many stores and eateries, its own post office and DMV, and four Starbucks, our guide said. “Starbuckses? Starbucks? I’m not sure what the plural of Starbucks is,” he added.

That got a wan laugh, but his next joke — one that was about military acronyms — went right over our heads.

“Sorry,” the soldier apologized. “It’s in the script.”

What script? I later discovered that Pentagon guides are required to memorize 33 pages of information and recite it more or less verbatim. (They are also required to throw in at least two fun facts, submitted and approved in advance.)

After transiting the mall area, we walked through many featureless office hallways while listening to our guide recite the history of the building and the military with the same, brain-numbing cadence developed by flight attendants to lull demanding passengers to sleep. The last thing I heard before blinkering out of consciousness was the preposition-intensive mission of the U.S. Navy: “operating on, under, above and from the sea.” (Beside, beyond and between must have been taken by the Coast Guard.)

I started paying attention again when we entered a chapel devoted to the people who died during the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon. A small room bathed in eerie green light, it contains panels etched with the names of the dead, and a book for writing condolences to their families. A few tourists wrote notes while the rest of us loitered around, feeling sad. As we left the chapel, the guide pointed out the walls that were destroyed by the aircraft, and noted that they’d been carefully rebuilt so there’d be no visible seam or scar.

As the tour came to a close, our guide told us a final fun fact. During the Cold War, he said, Soviet spy satellites noticed a structure at the center of the Pentagon courtyard attracting large numbers of people. The Russians thought it was the entrance to an underground bunker, he said, but it was actually a hot dog stand. “It was rumored that a lot of their nuclear arsenal was aimed at that building,” the soldier added with a laugh.

That didn’t exactly strike me as funny, especially after seeing the 9/11 memorial, but I chuckled politely and then escaped gratefully back into civilian life.

Pro tip: Put the phone away, or you might never see it again.

More adventures with the Staycationer

Is a White House tour worth the wait?

How to visit D.C.'s secret Navy museum

The Frederick Douglass house: D.C.’s answer to Monticello

• Skip to right header navigation
• Skip to main content
• Skip to primary sidebar

MY WANDERLUSTY LIFE

#TimeBudgetTravel

How to Get to the Pentagon for Your Tour Because It’s Confusing as Hell

Last Updated: February 9, 2021 //  by  Ashley Smith 6 Comments

You need to know how to get to the Pentagon for your tour. You’re out walking circles around the shipping dock of a BestBuy and can’t for the life of you figure out HOW TO GET TO THE PENTAGON FOR YOUR TOUR, for the love of God. “Park at the Mall” they said. “There’ll be a tunnel” they said.

Well lucky for you, I’ve already gone through this hell and come out the other side. Which, indeed, was at the Pentagon through a pedestrian tunnel. But, of course, it’s not as simple as all that. Directions for the average Joe to access the world’s most top-secret and heavily-guarded spaces rarely are, I’m afraid.

When preparing for my recent Pentagon tour, I’d read they recommend you park at the Pentagon City Mall across the street and take the (what I thought would be blatantly obvious for some reason) pedestrian tunnel and voila! There would be the Pentagon! With a well-worn welcome mat and white wicker rocking chairs to boot.

Turns out, the world is not the giant Cracker Barrel Old Country Store we all thought it was, despite the amount of useless crap we encounter on a daily basis. 

I found the directions for how to get to the Pentagon for your tour to be… misleading and head-scratching at best. So to save you all sorts of time and frustration and an overwhelming fear of looking hella suspicious as you lurk outside the Pentagon walls, let’s get to it.

Where is the Pentagon?

Oh, okay. So you’re at the very start of your Pentagon tour planning. In that case, I should point out that the Pentagon is actually not in Washington, D.C. at all. It’s in Arlington, Virginia.

Regardless, it’s just a short 5 to 10-minute drive from the Washington Monument, i.e. really damn close to everything you’re doing in Washington, D.C. anyway. Its address is: THE PENTAGON and, despite the massive protective wall, armed guards, and strict no photography policy, they’re happy to invite you in to take a tour!

If. you. can. find. it.

The Pentagon, headquarters for the Department of Defense that it is, is itself a master of disguise hiding in plain sight. You can be standing just across the street from it and STILL NOT SEE IT.

They’ll invite you in, but approving your application is about as far as they’ll go in helping you achieve this. The rest is up to you, soldier tourist. It’s my firm belief that objective #1 in Basic Military Training is Find your way to the Pentagon Visitor Center, ya ninny!

Here’s where the Pentagon is:

How to get to the Pentagon for your tour if you’re driving 

If you’re like me, you’re driving around Washington, D.C. in your own vehicle. It’s a perfectly commuter-friendly city so why the heck not? Therefore, you’ll also drive yourself to your Pentagon tour because you’ve got other things to see in Arlington later.

After getting approved, you’ll receive some information including, vaguely, how to arrive for your Pentagon tour. It will say: Sure, you can totally drive here! Well you can, and here’s how. But first, you should know…

Where to park for a Pentagon tour

The Pentagon is SURROUNDED by parking space (bold, italics, all caps, and underlined for emphasis). But don’t you dare try to park there.

When taking a tour of the Pentagon, park in the “Pentagon City Parking Garage.” Its address is 891-895 Army Navy Drive, Arlington, VA and it’s the parking garage for the Pentagon City Mall also known as Fashion Centre at Pentagon City. But all you really need to know is “Pentagon City Parking Garage” because that’s how it is in Waze. Let’s not even pretend we know how to read maps anymore.

Parking in this garage you’ll pay a small hourly rate but it’s much more affordable than hiring a leading defense attorney when you get detained after trying to pull your car up to the Pentagon.

How much does it cost to park at Pentagon City parking garage?

• 0-2 hours: $3
• 2-3 hours: $4 — which is all you’ll really need for a Pentagon tour, max
• 3-4 hours: $5 — if you plan on eating lunch at the mall like I did
• 4-5 hours: $9
• 5-6 hours: $11
• 6-9 hours: $17
• 9-10 hours: $18 — if you are still so incredibly lost 
• 10-24 hours: $20
• Maximum daily rate: $20 — if you’ve just completely given up and resigned to spend the night in your car
• Leading Defense Attorney: Powerball winnings + your first born

Also check out ─ Since you’re probably not in town just to take a tour of the Pentagon, be sure to check out my entire 3-day Washington DC itinerary here . It covers everything you think you can do in that time… and then tons more.

How to walk to the Pentagon

After parking at the Pentagon City Parking Garage, if your Pentagon tour is the only thing on your agenda, exit the parking garage in the direction of Army Navy Drive (which is north if you’re one of the few people that sort of information is actually useful to).

When you reach the sidewalk, you should have the entrance to the parking garage on your left, and Macy’s on your right.

Also on your left-hand side will be a street light and a crosswalk, cross the street here . Yes, towards what looks simply like a parking lot next to a concrete wall next to a highway. And, NO, you cannot park there instead.

After you cross two crosswalks, on your right-hand side you’ll see what appears to be a dark hole in the side of the concrete wall— that’s the Pentagon pedestrian tunnel . It looks sketchy as all get-out, I know, but most likely you’ll be the sketchiest person in there. For that’s the path to the Pentagon. 

Pro tip ─ What the pedestrian tunnel is not , is a direct connection from the inside of the mall to the doors of the Pentagon. That lil tidbit could’ve saved me a good amount of stress that I would later use when I thought I forgot to take the pepper spray out of my purse before I rocked up to the Pentagon.

How to get to the Pentagon visitor center

Getting into the Pentagon compound is one thing. Finding the Pentagon Visitor Center is another. But don’t worry, I stopped everyone wearing a military uniform and everyone with a huge gun along the way to ask for directions so you don’t have to!  

After you walk through the pedestrian tunnel, you’ll find yourself in an even-larger parking lot that you can’t even think about parking in. When the tunnel opens up you’ll be ushered into another walkway— continue down this path because there are literally no signs telling you where to go and you really don’t have any other options.

Plus, knowing how out of place you must seem in a place like this is starting to make your pits sweat. It’s like they don’t want people just casually walking into the Pentagon off the street. Weird. 

Walk down this pathway until you can’t walk any farther (because it dead ends at a short wall, behind which is another parking lot. With great military might comes a great need for parking, apparently.) Turn right here. Walk alllllll the way down until the sidewalk curves slightly left, then turn left to follow the sidewalk.

Continue straight down this path until the actual Pentagon is on your left. Eventually you’ll see a clear entrance into the building surrounded by, yes, uniformed members of the military with really large guns and a pleasant overhang protecting you from the elements.

Before attempting to enter the Pentagon of your own volition, it’d be best to check in with one of these fellas/gals to further inquire where to head next.

I’d like the record to state that I DID NOT take the next three photos. These are screenshots from Google Maps, please don’t arrest me. I repeat: I DID NOT TAKE THESE PHOTOS. (You just know they’re listening…)

From this point on you’ll gloriously only have the option of going where you’re told to go. You did It! Mission accomplished! Look out, Tom Cruise! Outta my way, Liam Neeson! The name is Smith, Ashley Smith, and I’ve got a particular set of travel skills.

Also check out ─ Need more awesome things to do in our nation’s capital? Check out how I spent another long weekend in Washington DC .

How to get to the Pentagon for your tour by metro

If you’re fairly adept at using public transportation, how to get to the Pentagon for your tour may be a little easier by train. And if visiting the Pentagon is the only business you have to take care of in Arlington, this would be a great option for you.

If, like me, you had plans to visit the Marine Corps War Memorial et al afterwards, you should probably just drive.

The Pentagon actually has its own stop on Washington’s Metrorail system via both the blue and yellow lines. And guess what? Exiting the Pentagon metro stop puts you virtually directly in front of the Pentagon Visitor Center.

Is it really that easy? I dunno, will you inevitably be insulted by that infuriating peg game every time you dine at Cracker Barrel? (That’s a yes.) 

Interested in WWII sites? ─ If you’re interested in checking out other World War II sites while you’re visiting the area, be sure to check out my post on WWII sites in Washington DC (and Arlington, VA) you shouldn’t miss!

If you’re traveling to the Pentagon from Washington, D.C., you’ll catch either a:

• Blue line train in the direction of “Franconia-Springfield” or
• Yellow line train in the direction of “Huntington”
• DC Metro rail map here . 

Exit the train at the Pentagon Metro Station – not the Pentagon City Metro Station. If you get off at the Pentagon City Metro Station, you’ve gone too far—either hop back on in the opposite direction, or continue via the HOW TO WALK TO THE PENTAGON directions above.

Exit the Pentagon Metro Station and you’ll be just about face-to-face with the Pentagon Visitor Center and the heavies that guard it. (It’s the big blue M next to the word Pentagon in the animation above.)

Pro tip ─ When returning to Washington, D.C. after your tour, you’ll want to catch either a blue line train in the direction of “Largo Town Center” or a yellow line train in the direction of “Greenbelt.”

How to get to the Pentagon for your tour by taxi or rideshare

Now that you know there’s a Metro station at the Pentagon, that’s going to make your life a whole lot easier (unless you’re driving, in which case SORRY SUCKA—Just kidding, driving yourself around is cool).

To take a taxi or Uber or Lyft or Flibbityboo or whatever to your Pentagon tour, simply have them drop you off at the Pentagon Metro Station . Chances are they’ve done this before and know exactly where to go. There’s also a small chance they may not be keen on venturing to the land of “all vehicles are subject to search.” In which case, Thank you, next. Ain’t nobody got time for “that’s not mine, I swear!”

Pro tip ─ If you’re looking for a Pentagon Visitor Center address, you won’t find one. Instead, simply use Pentagon Metro Station in your rideshare app.

Lack of parking and accessibility aside, a tour of the Pentagon is totally worth it . Getting to go inside one of the most secure and important buildings in the entire world is an amazing feeling and honor.

You’ll see things you’ve never even imagined and rub elbows with the country’s military elite. And you’ll ride that high until they remind you that you don’t have enough security clearance to even use the restrooms in there.

More info for your Pentagon tour

Heading to Washington DC? Read hotel reviews on TripAdvisor  or  book your room now ! But where do I personally recommend? I stayed at the Pod Hotel DC on this trip and loved it! For where else I’ve stayed in DC, check out this post .  Don’t forget to pick up a DC guidebook:  Check out this one ! Like this post? Have questions? Hit me up on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

How will you be getting to the Pentagon for your tour? Let me know below!

Don’t want to forget this info? PIN ME FOR LATER ⇣⇣⇣

Subscribe to MWL

About Ashley Smith

Ashley is a historian and Oktoberfest expert & tour guide. She has traveled to 33 countries and specializes in quick trips throughout Europe and the Americas that prioritize hiking adventures, museums of all kinds, cultural experiences, and jam-packed itineraries. She hails from Memphis, TN and currently lives in Boston with her husband and two feline sidekicks.

Get my 2024 Oktoberfest Party Planning Checklist here!

Free 2024 Oktoberfest Packing Checklist

Get my 2023 Oktoberfest Packing List here!

Want more  Oktoberfest ?

Belize Packing List

Iceland packing list, get my 2024 hotel booking checklist here.

Subscribe to MWL!

Tmb packing list 2024, morocco packing list 2024, 2024 oahu bucket list.

• Alaska Insight
• Watch KAKM Live
• Indie Alaska
• Ways to Watch
• There is Hope
• AK Passport
• In My Family
• KSKA Schedule
• Hometown, Alaska
• Listen to KSKA Live
• All Radio Programs
• Outdoor Explorer
• Addressing Alaskans
• State of Art
• Alaska Economic Report
• Hear me now
• Military Voices
• One Small Step
• Alaska Morning News
• Talk of Alaska
• Alaska News Nightly
• Traveling Music
• Black History in the Last Frontier
• Latest News
• Environment
• Mental Health
• Rural Health
• Alaska Legislature
• Washington, D.C.
• Public Safety
• ANCSA, 50th Anniversary
• Midnight Oil
• Daily Digest
• AKPM Community Education Engagement
• Race Matters
• Ready to Learn
• Library Explorers
• Molly of Denali
• Learning Media
• Parent Resources
• Watch PBS KIDS
• Workforce Development
• Ways to Give
• Benefits of Membership
• Together We Are Stronger
• AKPM Merchandise
• E-Newsletters
• Organization
• Public Documents
• Public Meetings
• Accessibility Commitment
• Donor Portal

After downsizing health care for years, Pentagon says medical readiness was a casualty

The Air Force put Todd Rasmussen through medical school, and he planned to serve a while and then go into private practice at the renowned Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. He started his military career as a vascular surgeon in Northern Virginia, a few weeks before Sept. 11, 2001.

“You could sort of see smoke from the Pentagon. I thought, boy, my military career as a surgeon … it’s gonna be vastly different than what I expected,” he recalls.

Rasmussen switched to trauma surgery as casualty numbers soared to the highest rates since Vietnam. At first, the way patients arrived within days from the war zone thousands of miles away amazed him. That wore off though, when he realized patients weren’t getting care soon enough. By the time they reached the U.S., their wounds were contaminated and sometimes too late to treat without amputation.

“It’s hard to admit we let we let somebody down and that somebody was a U.S. service member,” he says. “And so, you know, it’s hard to admit we could have done better. But I think maybe the only thing worse is not admitting it.”

Mounting casualties made it impossible to ignore, and the Pentagon did change. As with previous wars, saving lives on the battlefield inspired medical innovations in Iraq and Afghanistan. By moving medical care closer to the front, and treating combat wounds within the so-called “golden hour,” or even the first 30 minutes after injury, casualty rates dropped.

Now Rasmussen and other veteran medical officers warn that U.S. military health care again needs a course correction. After a decade of downsizing, Defense Department officials also admit they need to rebuild the medical force and the general health of active duty troops. But restoring medical readiness to where it was during the last war, much less where is needs to be for the next one, is a by all accounts a herculean task.

War is the mother of invention

By 2005, about when he had planned to be going into private practice, Rasmussen instead deployed to Iraq. He saw the medical innovations in real time.

“I remember one U.S. service member who came to us … by helicopter from the front lines in Fallujah. And he had been operated on by a small group of surgeons near the front line. I think the assumption was that we would need to amputate this limb because of the extent of the soft tissue injury in the thigh,” he says.

In past wars, a wound like that would have denied the lower leg blood flow for too long, leaving no option but amputation. On closer inspection though, Rasmussen saw that the front-line doctors had used a temporary shunt in a new way. Essentially, they stuck a plastic straw into the thigh to keep blood flowing around the wound, saving the leg.

“We said, ‘Wait a minute! We can actually fix this… put the amputation saw away’,” he says.

A spiral in care

Rasmussen deployed six times between 2005 and 2012. On his first tour to Iraq, he worked in tents and saw medics improvising — using cargo straps as tourniquets. On his last tour, in Afghanistan, he operated in a fully equipped hospital with new concrete floors and access to MRI and CT scans. Then the wars wound down. And Rasmussen felt some of the progress slide back.

“There were efforts to outsource … beneficiary care from the military treatment facilities to civilian institutions, which emptied out and hollowed out storied military medical centers like Walter Reed,” he says.

Even before the wars ended the Pentagon activated a plan to tame massive health care costs by pushing military medical care into the private sector, especially for family members.

The result was a sort of spiral. Military hospitals lost the minimum numbers of patients they needed to keep doctors in practice. The quality of military care suffered , and many clinicians left. Even more resigned during the pandemic, and Pentagon planners realized that the private health care sector they had hoped to lean on actually needed help itself, from the military. But the cuts kept going, says Rasmussen.

Pentagon officials even floated an idea to close the Uniform Services University, the military’s medical school, which trains up military doctors and preserves medical advances, like those made during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I mean, why do we need a military medical academy?” Rasmussen jokes.

“They achieved the highest rate of survival from battlefield wounds in the history of warfare. They were able to save people that would have died in any prior conflict,” says Dr. Art Kellerman, who served as dean of the Uniform Services University of the Health Sciences during the threats to shut it down.

Kellerman frames it as a national security priority. He says as much as a helmet or flak jacket, the success of U.S. military medicine gave troops confidence to rush into a firefight, knowing they would probably survive. U.S. allies joined the fight knowing a U.S. medevac would fly to the rescue within 30 minutes if they got blown up. What’s more, Kellerman says, those in the fight believed they’d not just survive, but live well.

“They dramatically improved their ability to rehabilitate wounded warriors after being injured. And many of them were able to return to duty and others were able to return home to be with their families and to function for the rest of their careers. Some of them today are members of Congress,” he says.

Kellerman says America needs that same ready medical force for any future conflict.

And the Pentagon now seems to agree.

A Defense Department internal memo obtained by NPR concluded that outsourcing didn’t actually save money but did hurt readiness. The so-called “stabilization memo” directs the Pentagon to reverse course, to bring more medical care back to its hospitals on base and increase medical staff, both to keep America’s standing army fit for duty and to make sure enough military doctors and nurses are trained up for a possible future war.

A different kind of war

Military strategists caution that generals often try to refight their last war, but America’s next war may be different. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the golden hour was possible because the U.S. had air superiority; the enemy had no planes or helicopters.

“Sooner or later, somewhere, we’re not going to have air superiority. And I don’t care if we think we are, we should plan for not having it,” says Dr. Sean Murphy, who served 44 years and retired in 2021 as Air Force deputy surgeon general.

Murphy points to Ukraine, where two conventional armies suffer massive casualties being evacuated by ground.

Or even more extreme: a possible conflict with China around Taiwan.

“What we’ve realized when we start looking at a theater like the Pacific, and the distances and a peer-to-peer fight, there is no way we’re going to get to the golden hour. So if we’re not going to be able to get a surgeon or somebody to the golden hour, then what we have to do is … to make everybody a medic,” he says.

To do that he says, the Pentagon needs, urgently, to build back its ready medical force.

“The most important fighting system we have is the human system. It’s not a plane or a ship or a tank,” says Rasmussen. He says he saw that again and again when he served.

“And that human system is only optimized and cared for if there is a robust and expert military health system,” he says. “I think degrading that risks our national security.”

Quil Lawrence, NPR

Related articles more from author, bronson, lafrance offer different views and priorities in alaska public media-adn mayoral runoff debate, homeschool ruling is on hold — but only through the end of june, judge rules, watch our anchorage mayoral runoff debate 2024.

Election Updates: Omar draws criticism for suggesting some Jewish students are ‘pro-genocide.’

• Share full article

Maggie Astor

Omar draws criticism for suggesting some Jewish students are ‘pro-genocide.’

Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, whose daughter was among the students arrested at a Columbia University protest encampment against Israel’s actions in Gaza, suggested while visiting the protesters on campus last week that some Jewish students supported genocide.

Ms. Omar, a Democrat, was rejecting the argument that the protests were antisemitic, noting that many of the participants were Jewish.

“I think it is really unfortunate that people don’t care about the fact that all Jewish kids should be kept safe, and that we should not have to tolerate antisemitism or bigotry for all Jewish students, whether they’re pro-genocide or anti-genocide,” she said.

Earlier in the week, the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, used his own visit to Columbia to suggest that President Biden should summon the National Guard to college campuses, a prospect that brought to mind the National Guard’s killing of four unarmed student protesters at Kent State University in Ohio during the Vietnam War. He was accompanied by his Republican colleague Anthony D’Esposito, who accused the pro-Palestinian protesters of being “proud that you’ve been endorsed by Hamas.”

Representative Jared Moskowitz of Florida, who came to Columbia with other Democrats who support Israel, likened some protesters to the white nationalists who marched in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017.

And at Washington University in St. Louis, the Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein joined a demonstration and was arrested along with dozens of other protesters.

As pro-Palestinian student protests have spread and intensified in the wake of a police crackdown at Columbia , a procession of politicians have visited campuses with words of support or condemnation. The visits underscore how profoundly the protests have become intertwined with American politics — and the extent to which many elected officials are taking sides on what, if not for the police response and the statements from national figures, might have been a small subplot in the much larger story of what is happening in Gaza.

Ms. Omar’s suggestion that some Jewish students were pro-genocide drew backlash, with the Anti-Defamation League’s leader calling it “blood libel” and CNN asking Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont on Sunday whether he was “comfortable” with it. (Mr. Sanders, who is Jewish and supports the protests, said that opposition to antisemitism was Ms. Omar’s “essential point,” and that “the word ‘genocide’ is something that is being determined by the International Court of Justice.”)

Ms. Omar responded to the A.D.L. criticism by citing comments reported by Palestinian and other Arab students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, including “kill all Arabs” and “level Gaza.” She wrote on social media , “This is the pro-genocide I was talking about, can you condemn this like I have condemned antisemitism and bigotry of all kind?”

The campus visits began last Monday with the group of pro-Israel Democrats: Mr. Moskowitz, Daniel Goldman of New York, Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey and Kathy Manning of North Carolina. In an interview with CNN afterward, Mr. Moskowitz referred to comments like “Go back to Poland” and said, “I know the people saying this aren’t, you know, white Aryan males with tiki torches, but they have the same message.”

At many points, there has been a divide between student encampments — which have been peaceful and have included many Jewish participants — and demonstrations just off campus, where some people have made overtly antisemitic comments.

Mr. Johnson, the House speaker, visited Columbia on Wednesday with several other House Republicans: Mr. D’Esposito, Mike Lawler and Nicole Malliotakis of New York, and Virginia Foxx of North Carolina.

Mr. Johnson met privately with Jewish students, then called on Mr. Biden to bring in the National Guard and on Congress to “revoke federal funding to these universities if they can’t keep control.” He said, referring to antisemitism, “Powerful people have refused to condemn it, and some have even peddled it themselves.”

Some of the protesters jeered him, and one pro-Israel counterprotester dismissed his visit as “a political stunt.”

That visit, in turn, came a week after the event that precipitated the escalation of the protests: The president of Columbia, Nemat Shafik, who goes by Minouche, testified before a congressional committee under questioning led by Representative Elise Stefanik, Republican of New York, who has grilled a series of college presidents over allegations that they were failing to combat antisemitism on campus.

Ms. Shafik called the New York Police Department to break up a pro-Palestinian encampment the next day. More than 100 students were arrested, but the protesters rebuilt the encampment, and the protests quickly spread to other campuses nationwide.

Mr. Johnson and his group were followed by Ms. Omar, who was followed by two other Democrats from the progressive “Squad” — Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman of New York, who met with the protesters at Columbia to express support.

And hundreds of miles away, at Washington University in St. Louis, Ms. Stein was arrested on Saturday along with dozens of students.

Reporting from Atlanta

In Atlanta, Kamala Harris leads the push to shore up Democrats’ support from Black voters.

Vice President Kamala Harris made a new effort to energize Black voters in battleground states on Monday, visiting Atlanta for the kickoff of a national economic tour that will highlight how the Biden administration says its policies are helping a constituency that will be vital to Democrats’ success in November.

Speaking to a largely Black crowd of about 400 people, Ms. Harris laid out ways that she and President Biden have sought to improve Black Americans’ upward mobility and help them realize their business ambitions. A chief objective of the tour, she said, was to let Black business owners and entrepreneurs know about the resources available to them.

“I need the help of the leaders who are here to get the word out so people know what is available to them,” she said during a conversation at the Georgia International Convention Center with Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings of the financial literacy podcast “Earn Your Leisure,” which offers business advice to its more than two million listeners, a majority of whom are Black.

Explaining how government policies have widened the racial wealth gap over the years, Ms. Harris pointed to the Biden administration’s attempts to try to narrow it, including small-business grants and efforts to forgive student loans.

“We want to make sure people know about it — and then know where they can receive — the support to be ready to take on the work and then to grow their capacity,” she said.

Her remarks at the official White House-hosted event — drier and less political than her forceful campaign speeches on abortion recently — meandered at times.

“As much as anything, the spirit behind the push for access to capital, and in particular, on this tour, focusing on minority small businesses and Black-owned small businesses, and small businesses and entrepreneurs who are Black men, is to recognize the disparities that have existed around the access to the opportunity to achieve success,” she said at one point.

But at other moments Ms. Harris was more pointed, including when she defended diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives that conservative lawmakers have pushed to dismantle in state governments and at colleges and universities .

“In spite of those who in certain parts of our country want to attack D.E.I., we understand that you can’t truly invest in the strength of our nation if you don’t pay attention to diversity, equity and inclusion,” she said.

The vice president’s Atlanta visit, her 12th trip to Georgia since taking office, was the first stop in a tour of several battleground states in the coming weeks. Much of the tour will focus on Black small businesses and economic issues that are especially pressing for Black communities. She will visit Detroit next week, aides said.

Ms. Harris’s tour will also seek to engage Black men, whom Democrats are urgently courting as polls show them softening in their support for Mr. Biden. Much of the crowd at the vice president’s event consisted of Black male political and business leaders, as well as a contingent of students from Morehouse College, a historically Black men’s college in Atlanta where President Biden will deliver the commencement address next month.

Before her speech, Ms. Harris visited an entrepreneurship hub near downtown Atlanta where she spoke with Black small-business owners.

Flanked by Georgia’s Democratic senators, Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, as well as Representative Nikema Williams, the state Democratic Party chair, Ms. Harris highlighted the Biden administration’s marquee legislation, like the CHIPS and Science Act, which offers funding for small-business research projects.

She also underlined the roughly $7 billion that the administration has poured into historically Black colleges and universities, the largest investment of any White House administration.

Atlanta is set to receive more than $150 million for a project called The Stitch that is meant to revitalize the city’s downtown areas and connect them to its growing midtown neighborhoods. Georgia is one of 40 states that will receive money from a White House program that aims to repair the decades-old societal damage from federal transportation projects that disproportionately displaced Black communities.

Chris Cameron

Matt Gaetz faces a last-minute challenger in his Republican primary in Florida.

Aaron Dimmock, a retired Navy officer and aviator, has entered the Republican primary to challenge Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida — jumping into the race hours before a filing deadline last Friday.

Mr. Dimmock’s campaign committee shares a treasurer with American Patriots PAC, a group that was used by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy to support candidates who were aligned with him in the 2022 midterms. Mr. Gaetz led the revolt among House Republicans that ultimately ousted Mr. McCarthy from the speakership.

Mr. Dimmock and representatives of American Patriots PAC did not respond to requests for comment. The primary for the First Congressional District, which covers Pensacola and the western Florida Panhandle, will take place on Aug. 20.

Mr. Dimmock, a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, served as a pilot for the P-3 surveillance plane for the Navy . In an interview with the U.S. Naval Academy Alumni Association in 2020, Mr. Dimmock said that he had deployed to Bosnia and Kosovo and had completed several tours in the Middle East. He also described flying surveillance missions over New York City in the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center. He became an instructor pilot, later worked as a recruiting officer and closed out his career as a Navy liaison in the Pentagon. The Navy operates a major air base in Pensacola.

Mr. Gaetz quickly attacked Mr. Dimmock on social media, pointing to LinkedIn posts that Mr. Dimmock made as a business consultant in 2020 in support of racial diversity and the Black Lives Matter movement after the murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.

“Meet Aaron W. Dimmock,” Mr. Gaetz wrote. “The B.L.M. supporting D.E.I. instructor running against me in the Republican Primary. I knew former Representative McCarthy would be getting a puppet of his to run. I didn’t know it would be a Woke Toby Flenderson!”

Jazmine Ulloa

Reporting from Washington

Koch group attacks Biden on the economy, hoping to engage Latino voters.

The Libre Initiative, part of the political network created by the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers, on Monday will unveil a seven-figure voter engagement effort and ad campaign targeting members of Congress who have supported what it calls President Biden’s “punitive economic policies.”

The campaign, one of the most expansive undertaken by the group, will include digital ads, public events at Hispanic grocery stores and restaurants and a new Spanish language website criticizing “Bidenomics,” a term that conservatives have adopted to attack Mr. Biden’s economic policies.

Despite a run of positive economic data, including strong job growth and record unemployment , the economy has been a stubborn weakness for President Biden and Democrats, particularly among Black and Latino voters . Leaders at Libre, which gave The New York Times an early look at the plans, said they were focused on attracting Latinos on what they think is a winning issue for Republicans at a time when their party is seeking to increase its appeal to Hispanic voters.

“Bidenomics is devastating Latino families’ savings, quality of life and their ability to plan for the future,” Jose Mallea, Libre’s chief executive, said in a statement. “To reverse this trend, it’s critical that Latino families learn what overspending and overregulating are doing to our country’s economy — and prosperity.”

Libre, which describes itself as a center-right organization, is a sister branch of the Koch network’s super PAC Americans for Prosperity Action, which spent tens of millions of dollars trying to elevate Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, over former President Donald J. Trump in the Republican primary. But Libre, which has its own endorsement process, did not weigh in on the contest and has so far no plans to mobilize voters in support of Mr. Trump. Americans for Prosperity Action has not waded into the 2024 presidential election since Ms. Haley left the race.

Libre leaders said the aim of their latest campaign was to hold lawmakers accountable for supporting Biden policies that the group believes have contributed to high inflation and rising costs for food, utilities and other living expenses. It is targeting more than 20 congressional Democrats in more than a dozen states, including key presidential battlegrounds like Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania. The group rolled out a similar effort with an anti-“Bidenomics” message last year, but organizers said this campaign would be much larger in scope.

Latinos are projected to number about 36.2 million eligible voters, or nearly 15 percent of the American electorate, according to the latest analysis by the Pew Research Center. The demographic will be crucial in states like Nevada and Arizona, where they make up roughly one in four eligible voters, and Hispanic voters are also expected to play a decisive role in the battle for control of the House .

Although Latino voters still overall lean Democratic, Mr. Trump improved his performance with the slice of voters in 2020, and in some areas like South Florida and South Texas made sizable gains. But some Republicans have told The Associated Press that they have yet to see Mr. Trump follow through on his ambitious plans to court the electoral bloc this cycle. Mr. Biden, on the other hand, has stepped his up — and has been looking to sharpen his own economic message after an earlier push to reclaim the term “Bidenomics” largely fell flat.

In a recent tour through Nevada and Arizona , the president has championed historic investments in Latino small businesses and Hispanic-serving institutions, along with Biden administration policies that he said had cut Hispanic child poverty to record lows, lowered drug prescription and health care costs and tackled gun violence.

Two Latino voter groups, Somos Votantes and Somos PAC, have also come to Mr. Biden’s aid with historic investments comparable to those from Libre. The liberal organizations have earmarked $33 million to mobilize Hispanic voters for Mr. Biden and other key Democratic races in several battleground states. Somos Votantes plans to put $24 million toward expanding nonpartisan voter education programs.

The Libre campaign, titled “BideNOmics,” is targeting Senate Democrats in Montana, Nevada, Ohio and Wisconsin. It will focus on House members in heated contests across the country. In California, where Democrats and Republicans are locked in a fight for control of seats across the central and southern parts of the state, the group is taking aim at Representatives Josh Harder and Mike Levin. In New Mexico, their list includes Representative Gabriel Vasquez, and in Colorado, Representative Yadira Caraveo, both of whom clinched their seats last cycle after defeating their Republican opponents by less than a percentage point.

A preview of one of the four digital ads expected to run on social media and television and audio streaming services features a Latina who blames the president’s policies for the demise of the American dream.

“Coming to America meant an opportunity to chart your own future,” she said. “But now, Latino families across the country are being forced to make hard choices because of skyrocketing prices, and Bidenomics is robbing us of our chance at the American dream.”

The Spanish language website — NoBidenomics.com — criticizes the Biden administration policies it says have contributed to inflation, a high national debt and an expensive cost of living. The campaign’s community events, which began last week, will largely be held at super mercados, or Hispanic grocery stores, where participants will pass out gift cards for food.

The Biden-Trump face-off settles into an odd rhythm, with Trump largely off the campaign trail.

As former President Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan enters its third week , the presidential campaign is settling into an odd rhythm, with one of the two major candidates barnstorming the country and the other almost entirely absent from the trail.

For as many as four days a week for the foreseeable future, Mr. Trump will again be in a courtroom, visible mostly through the prism of journalists’ dispatches and his enraged social media posts. Today, however, is an off day before the trial resumes on Tuesday.

Since the trial began two-plus weeks ago, Mr. Trump has campaigned only in solidly Democratic New York; his one attempt at a weekend rally in a swing state, North Carolina, was canceled because of weather. And he has not yet chosen a running mate who could campaign on his behalf.

That makes this Wednesday, another off day, significant for him: He has two rallies scheduled, one in Waukesha, Wis., and one in Freeland, Mich., before he has to hurry back to New York.

President Biden will hold at least one campaign event per day on Tuesday and Wednesday. Over the weekend, he made an appearance at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, where he mocked Mr. Trump and the public dissection of his own age: “The 2024 election’s in full swing and, yes, age is an issue. I’m a grown man running against a 6-year-old.”

Vice President Kamala Harris is also scheduled to speak about the economy on Monday in Georgia, and about abortion rights on Wednesday in Florida.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose independent campaign could hurt Mr. Biden or Mr. Trump, depending on which polls you look at, will be on the campaign trail as well. After a rally on Long Island on Sunday, he has an event scheduled in Boston on Monday and is teasing a “major announcement” in Brooklyn on Wednesday.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says Americans are ‘voting out of fear.’

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sought to make the case on Sunday that he can do something no third-party or independent candidate has come close to doing in modern U.S. history: win a presidential election. Although polls show him far behind, both major-party campaigns, those of President Biden and former President Donald J. Trump, view Mr. Kennedy as a potential spoiler.

Speaking at a rally on Long Island outside New York City, Mr. Kennedy cited polls that he said his campaign had conducted, showing him winning in two scenarios: one in which he faced only Mr. Biden without Mr. Trump in the race, and one in which he faced Mr. Trump without Mr. Biden.

The reason he is behind in a three-way race, he maintained, is that “so many Americans are voting out of fear.”

“Their only strategy is to try to keep me off the ballot and then to make everybody terrified of Donald Trump,” he said of Democrats, “and on the other side, they do the same thing,” he added of Republicans. “When somebody is telling you to vote out of fear, they are trying to manipulate you into abandoning your values,” he said.

Mr. Kennedy acknowledged to the crowd in Holbrook, N.Y., that Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump differed in numerous ways.

“If you look at their personalities, their dispositions, their presentation, their ideology, their approach to life, their interactions with other people, there’s a huge, huge difference,” he said.

But he argued that issues on which Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump held starkly different positions — like abortion, border security, guns and transgender rights — were “culture war issues” that “are used to divide us all.” He said that on the national debt and chronic disease — issues he called “existential for our country” — their positions weren’t materially different.

In discussing the prevalence of chronic disease, Mr. Kennedy lamented the United States’ disproportionately high death rate from the coronavirus compared with the death rate experienced by other developed countries, a disparity attributable in part to the comparatively low uptake of vaccines that Mr. Kennedy has campaigned against.

He suggested — in contradiction of scientific evidence of the safety and efficacy of Covid vaccines, and data showing higher death rates in states with lower vaccination rates — that the nation’s poor Covid performance was a mark against vaccines.

“Whatever we’re doing, whatever we did, it was wrong,” Mr. Kennedy said, referring to vaccine mandates, lockdowns and other pandemic responses.

Maggie Haberman and Nicholas Nehamas

Trump and DeSantis meet for the first time since their bruising primary clashes.

Donald J. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida met on Sunday morning, according to three people briefed on the meeting, the first time they’ve done so since the end of a bruising Republican presidential primary that Mr. Trump won while relentlessly attacking Mr. DeSantis.

The meeting — which took place in Hollywood, Fla., according to one of the people briefed on the meeting — was the result of a weekslong effort by a longtime friend of Mr. Trump, the real-estate investor Steve Witkoff, who also has a relationship with Mr. DeSantis. The three men met alone in a private room at Shell Bay, Mr. Witkoff’s development and golf club, according to the person briefed on the meeting.

Mr. Trump is looking to bolster his fund-raising, an ability Mr. DeSantis demonstrated during the primary by tapping into a network of well-funded donors. And Mr. DeSantis — who has made clear he is interested in running for president again in 2028 — is seeking to shed the negative weight of his disappointing campaign. The meeting was reported earlier by The Washington Post.

A spokesman for Mr. Trump didn’t respond to an email seeking comment. A spokesman for Mr. DeSantis declined to comment.

Mr. DeSantis is not seen as a contender to join a Republican ticket with Mr. Trump, who is both the presumptive Republican nominee and on trial in Manhattan on charges he falsified business records to conceal hush-money payments to a porn star in the 2016 election. Both Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis have made clear that such a pairing doesn’t interest either of them, and they also live in the same state, which would make it an unconstitutional pairing unless one of them were to move out of Florida, which is unlikely to happen, especially since Mr. DeSantis is currently the governor.

Mr. DeSantis had been seen as Mr. Trump’s chief intraparty competition, and he was the target the Trump team focused on for months. The tensions between the two men — and their aides — often boiled over during the primary race. Mr. Trump excoriated Mr. DeSantis during the campaign, nicknaming him “Ron DeSanctimonious,” and criticizing him as being disloyal. Mr. DeSantis also claimed that Mr. Trump was unelectable at various points during his primary campaign, which was plagued by missteps and accusations of mismanagement.

Recently, Mr. DeSantis held a donor event the same weekend that Mr. Trump held a large fund-raiser for his campaign. During the fund-raiser, Mr. Trump revived the “DeSanctimonious” nickname, according to an attendee.

Still, allies of both men say it is politically beneficial for them to come together for the 2024 campaign and beyond.

Maggie Haberman

Former President Donald J. Trump confirmed his Sunday meeting with Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida in a social media post. “We had a great meeting yesterday, arranged by mutual friend Steve Witkoff, at his beautiful Shell Bay Club in Hollywood, Florida. The conversation mostly concerned how we would work closely together to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN. Also discussed was the future of Florida, which is FANTASTIC!” he wrote.

Neil Vigdor

Brady: United Against Gun Violence, a nonprofit that backs gun control, also cited in its criticism of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the independent presidential candidate’s closeness with N.F.L. star Aaron Rodgers. CNN reported Rodgers has shared conspiracy theories about the 2012 Newtown school shooting. Rodgers has denied claims that he said the shooting didn’t happen.

Brady: United Against Gun Violence, a nonprofit that backs gun control, criticized the presidential bid of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The group cited, among other factors, his skepticism about the issue and his endorsement of false claims that antidepressants are linked to school shootings. Kennedy’s campaign said decreased gun ownership has not curbed violence, calling it a symptom of a “profound illness.”

Former President Donald J. Trump denounced Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in social media posts over the weekend, suggesting concern that Kennedy might hurt him more than President Biden — something that isn't certain but that polls have shown is a possibility. “He’s a Radical Left Lunatic,” he wrote on Sunday, adding, “No Republican can vote for this guy.” Earlier, he said a vote for Kennedy would be “a WASTED PROTEST VOTE.”

Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, a possible vice-presidential pick for Donald Trump, continued on Sunday to defend killing her “untrainable” dog in a gravel pit, a story that has drawn public shock and outrage since she revealed it in a memoir . In a lengthy social media post , she said she had “followed the law and was being a responsible parent, dog owner, and neighbor.”

Advertisement

Official websites use .gov

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS

Children Take on the Pentagon for a Day

More than 8,000 children joined their parents and others for a series of special events and entertainment during "Bring a Child to Work Day" at the Pentagon.

The day began in the Pentagon Courtyard with speeches from senior Defense Department officials and a little bit of singing, break dancing, magic tricks and military performances. 

{{slideNumber}}/{{numSlides}} {{slideTitle}} - {{slideCaption}}

{{slideInfo.slideNumber}}/{{numSlides}} {{slideInfo.slideTitle}} - {{slideInfo.slideCaption}}

Spotlight: Month of the Military Child Spotlight: Month of the Military Child:  https://www.defense.gov/Spotlights/Month-of-the-Military-Child/

Subscribe to Defense.gov Products

Choose which Defense.gov products you want delivered to your inbox.

Related Stories

Defense.gov, helpful links.

• Live Events
• Today in DOD
• For the Media
• DOD Resources
• DOD Social Media Policy
• Help Center
• DOD / Military Websites
• Agency Financial Report
• Value of Service
• Taking Care of Our People
• FY 2025 Defense Budget
• National Defense Strategy

The Department of Defense provides the military forces needed to deter war and ensure our nation's security.