WASHINGTON — The Justice Department sent subpoenas to reporters at The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal demanding they appear before a grand jury — then pulled those subpoenas back, according to people with knowledge of the situation.
The Washington Post confirmed that one of its reporters was served a subpoena by the Trump administration as part of a wide-reaching crackdown on media leaks. That crackdown had already made headlines in January when FBI agents searched the home of a Washington Post reporter and took her electronic devices — an extraordinary and rarely used tactic. Reporters at The Wall Street Journal also received grand jury subpoenas, sources said, a move critics described as a direct threat to press freedom.
The reason the government chose to pull the subpoenas remains unclear, as does the specific news coverage the subpoenas were tied to. The withdrawal was first reported by The Washington Post on Tuesday and later confirmed by people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because the law enforcement action was not public.
Washington Post executive editor Matt Murray sent a staff email, obtained by The Associated Press, revealing that the subpoena had targeted Ellen Nakashima, a well-known national security reporter who has covered topics including the Iran war and deadly U.S. military boat strikes in the Caribbean Sea.
A newspaper spokesperson responded with a firm statement: “The unwarranted subpoena of our reporter Ellen Nakashima – a clear violation of constitutionally guaranteed press freedom – was another sign of the government seeking to compel journalists to become instruments of its investigations. We will continue to stand fully behind the journalism of The Washington Post and fight all efforts by any administration that violate our First Amendment rights.”
A spokesperson for The Wall Street Journal did not reply to a request for comment sent Tuesday. The Justice Department also did not immediately respond to an email seeking a statement.
Mark Schoeff Jr., a reporter at CQ Roll Call and president of the National Press Club, described the effort to force reporters into grand jury testimony as “one of the most aggressive actions against a free and independent press in recent memory.”
“Reporters were one step away from being forced to participate in a criminal investigation because they were doing their jobs. That should alarm every American who values a free press,” Schoeff said in a written statement.
The Justice Department has long maintained internal guidelines on how it handles news media leaks, revising those policies over time. While the department has occasionally obtained phone records from individual journalists across different administrations to identify sources for national security stories, compelling a reporter to personally testify before a grand jury is extremely uncommon.
In April, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi reversed a policy from the previous Democratic administration that had shielded journalists from having their phone records secretly obtained during leak investigations — a practice long opposed by news organizations and press freedom advocates.
The reversal restored prosecutors’ ability to use subpoenas, court orders, and search warrants to pursue government employees who make unauthorized disclosures to the press. A memo issued alongside the reversal stated that members of the media are “presumptively entitled to advance notice” of such investigative steps, that subpoenas must be “narrowly drawn,” and that search warrants must include safeguards limiting intrusion into materials related to newsgathering.
