WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� The New York Times on Wednesday filed a motion to quash subpoenas that the Justice Department served on journalists who reported on security concerns involving the new, , teeing up a significant court fight pitting press freedom against the the government鈥檚 ability to force reporters to identify sources.
鈥淎s we set out in our motion, these subpoenas are brought in bad faith to punish The Times for its coverage. They violate the constitutional rights of The Times and its journalists. We are going to court to defend our journalists鈥� rights to report freely on the administration and to provide the public with stories that matter,鈥� David McCraw, the newspaper鈥檚 senior vice president and deputy general counsel, said in a statement.
The filing was made under seal in the Southern District of New York, where the journalists were summoned in subpoenas delivered last Friday to testify before a federal grand jury. The Times had said it expected five journalists to be subpoenaed; three were ultimately served.
The subpoenas, delivered to reporters at their homes, marked a dramatic escalation of the Trump administration鈥檚 crackdown on media leaks that free press advocates swiftly condemned as a government effort to intimidate news organizations. It followed an reporter鈥檚 home and the seizure of her electronic devices.
The subpoenas centered on reporting the newspaper had done on security concerns involving the new .
The new jet in question, a present from Qatar that Trump鈥檚 administration spent $400 million to retrofit and upgrade, recently . But the Republican president used to leave in Turkey last week.
The Times, citing anonymous sources, reported that the switch had come at the urging of the Secret Service and that the newer plane lacked some of the advanced security features of the older aircraft, including antimissile capabilities. On social media, Trump denied security concerns.
The Justice Department has justified the subpoenas by saying that 鈥渢o be clear, reporters are not the targets, those leaking classified information are.鈥�
鈥淲e value and appreciate the important role that the press plays in this country,鈥� the department said after the Times reported it had received the subpoenas. 鈥淏ut DOJ also plays an important role to make sure that the people entrusted with our nation鈥檚 secrets do what they鈥檙e supposed to do with that information, which means not sharing classified information.鈥�
Asked about the issue at his Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said: 鈥淭he Department of Justice requires that I authorize it, which I did. And those reporters 鈥� we’re not targeting reporters. They’re material witnesses.鈥�
When Sen. Peter Welch, a Vermont Democrat, pointed out to Blanche that the department wants to ask the journalists who their sources were, Blanche replied, 鈥淣o, the question we want to ask them is who provided them with classified national security information, which everybody in this body should want to protect.鈥�
The Justice Department over the years has developed, and revised, internal policies governing how it will respond to news media leaks.
Though the department across presidential administrations has periodically seized the phone records of individual journalists in hopes of identifying sources for national security stories, it is extremely rare for the government to attempt to compel a reporter to reveal their sources before a grand jury.
In April 2025, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi rescinded a policy from President Joe Biden鈥檚 Democratic administration that protected journalists from having their phone records secretly seized during leak investigations 鈥� a practice long decried by news organizations and press freedom groups. The moves again gave prosecutors the authority to use subpoenas, court orders and search warrants to hunt for government officials who make 鈥渦nauthorized disclosures鈥� to journalists.
A memo Bondi issued said members of the press are 鈥減resumptively entitled to advance notice of such investigative activities,鈥� and subpoenas are to be 鈥渘arrowly drawn.鈥� Warrants must also include 鈥減rotocols designed to limit the scope of intrusion into potentially protected materials or newsgathering activities,鈥� the memo stated.
In January, FBI agents searched the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson, who has been covering Trump鈥檚 transformation of the federal government, as part of a leak investigation into a Pentagon contractor accused of taking home classified information.
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