Topic of the Week: Dire Conditions Reported Aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln

The USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier has been out to sea for more than eight months and is now stationed in the Arabian Sea to support U.S. military operations during the war with Iran. Sailors on board have reported food and water shortages, little time off, low morale, and threats of suicide. Our analysts rated media coverage about the conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and the response from the Trump administration in our Topic of the Week.

The most fact-based and minimally biased coverage from our content set came from an article published by Stars and Stripes, an American military newspaper. The article reports on a meeting between family members and Navy leadership at which families shared stories about sailors’ mental health struggles. Stars and Stripes interviewed several sailors and their family members about the conditions aboard the ship, and the article includes statements from Navy officials. Analysts rated the reporting as a “mix of fact reporting and analysis” with a “middle” bias.

A video from the Ryan McBeth YouTube channel discusses various reports on conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. “Some of the viral claims are exaggerated, recycled, impossible to verify, but the underlying problem appears to be real,” he says. McBeth cites an article from MS NOW and warns that some information shared on social media is misleading. He gives facts about how the Navy handles maintenance on aircraft carriers, how supplies are replenished, and what uptempo missions are. “…I don’t care if you’re as tough as Shipwreck from G.I. Joe, nine months port and starboard are going to take a toll in your brain,” he says. McBeth says President Trump, as commander in chief, is ultimately responsible: “There is a difference between an unavoidable hardship and preventable neglect.” Analysts found the video to be “analysis” with a “middle” bias.

An article from Daily Beast and a video from the Aaron Parnas YouTube channel were both rated as “opinion” with a “strong left” bias. The Daily Beast article begins with this headline: “How Trump Slaps Lincoln in the Face on the Ship Bearing His Name.” The article says President Trump “has never himself borne battle, but he has heedlessly sent others to face it in his own war of choice…” The article includes stories from family members, including one sailor who jumped off the ship and spent an hour in the water before he was pulled out. It describes the deployment as “where so many lives are being upended while those in power shrug.” Analysts noted the image of a disappointed President Lincoln and the article’s criticism of Trump (the subhead says, “The scandal on the USS Lincoln tells us everything about Trump’s measure of devotion”) when categorizing the bias as “strong left.”

The Aaron Parnas video proclaims in the headline, “Hegseth FURIOUS as Military Families EXPOSE the TRUTH, EXCLUSIVE Messages!” Parnas focuses on comments by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who said reports about worsening conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln are “misrepresented.” Parnas plays a clip of Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who says during an interview with CNN that Hegseth’s comments are “a disservice and profoundly disrespectful to the sailors.” Parnas reads messages he received from service members and their families who verify the accounts from the USS Abraham Lincoln and say that service members elsewhere are struggling, as well. “Pete Hegseth … has failed our service members abroad,” Parnas concludes, adding that Hegseth is trying to censor service members and the media who are talking about it. 

Reporting from RedState focuses on a visit by U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) chief Admiral Brad Cooper to the USS Abraham Lincoln. The article calls reports of poor conditions about the ship a “non-troversy” and accuses legacy media and Democrat politicians of using them as “their latest political cudgel with which to attack President Trump.” It defends the military’s decision to extend the crew’s tour due to the “situation in Iran,” stating that it’s not surprising that sailors are going “stir-crazy from time to time”: “… some are going to have more serious issues and some are going to complain to mom that the food isn’t like her home cooking. That’s life in the military.” After this article was published, an update was added to include an official statement from Admiral Cooper addressing mental health concerns on the USS Abraham Lincoln. Analysts found that the article downplays concerns about the sailor’s well-being and expresses support for Trump and Hegseth. It was rated as “opinion” with a “strong right” bias. 

Finally, an article from Twitchy was found to be “selective” and to have a “strong right” bias. It focuses on the reports that sailors were trying to commit suicide by jumping overboard, but it expresses doubt: “We were ready to take this story seriously until we saw that it had been picked up and run with by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins. Now we’re not so sure.” The writer says, “CNN is doing what it can to make it a national scandal” and then displays several posts on X that question CNN’s reporting. Analysts found that the article is “highly protective of the Administration’s narrative and dismissive of any evidence to the contrary” but doesn’t really report on anything. Its purpose is “discrediting the sailors’ conditions on the premise that CNN is spinning the story.”

Want to see if you agree with our analysts? Follow along with our weekly Topic of the Week exercise by visiting our website. New Topics of the Week are posted each Monday. Read the articles and watch the videos yourself, then come back on Wednesday to compare your scores with our analysts. Learn more here.

Beth Heldebrandt is Director of Communications at Ad Fontes Media. She has more than 35 years of experience in the fields of journalism and public relations, and was an adjunct instructor of journalism for 17 years at Eastern Illinois University. Beth has a B.A. in journalism from Southern Illinois University-Carbondale and an M.A. in English from Eastern Illinois University. She’s a mom and grandma, and enjoys traveling, puzzles and reading.