Taking to X, ESPN's Jeff Passan called out the U.S. Department of Defense for removing an article regarding Jackie Robinson's Army history. Screen grab: ESPN
By Ben Axelrod on

When it comes to the U.S. Department of Defense’s removal of an article about Jackie Robinson’s history in the Army, Jeff Passan didn’t mince words.

“This used to be the URL for a story on the @DeptofDefense website about Jackie Robinson’s time in the Army. The story has been removed,” the ESPN MLB insider posted to X on Tuesday night, along with a link of the now-defunct article. “The ghouls who did this should be ashamed. Jackie Robinson was the embodiment of an American hero. Fix this now.”

Passan’s post came shortly after other outlets called attention to the removal of several historical webpages, which appears to be related to President Donald Trump’s executive order regarding diversity, equity and inclusion efforts (DEI).

As noted by KSBW.com, the URL for the article referenced by Passan — originally titled “Sports Heroes Who Served: Baseball Great Jackie Robinson Was WWII Soldier” — now includes the phrase “deisports” while linking to a web page with a “404 – Page Not Found” error. Meanwhile, a search on the Army’s website for “Jackie Robinson” returns 18 results, 14 of which have now been deleted, including articles titled “U.S. Army Soldiers face off against Romanian National Team in Jackie Robinson Trophy baseball game” and “‘Wagonmasters’ Ruck to Honor Jackie Robinson.”

While the Department of Defense said earlier this week that pages honoring a Black Medal of Honor winner and Japanese American service members were taken down mistakenly, a Pentagon spokesperson staunchly defended the administration’s anti-DEI efforts. The affected pages also included the same “dei” addition to their URLs found in the now-removed Robinson article while also redirecting to a “404 – Page Not Found” destination before later being restored.

While ESPN personalities haven’t had many political run-ins in recent years, this is an obvious instance of the current administration’s efforts intersecting with the world of sports and a cause Passan understandably feels passionately about. It will be worth monitoring whether his post — which has received more than 5,800 retweets and 24,000 likes as of Wednesday morning — helps lead to any change or ultimately results in the DOD merely doubling down.

Update: The DOD did, in fact, double down on its original statement.

Update: The story has now been restored.

About Ben Axelrod

Ben Axelrod is a veteran of the sports media landscape, having most recently worked for NBC's Cleveland affiliate, WKYC. Prior to his time in Cleveland, he covered Ohio State football and the Big Ten for outlets including Cox Media Group, Bleacher Report, Scout and Rivals.

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