A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Some media executives are calling the FBI's search of a reporter's home an alarming intrusion into the freedom of the press.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
That search of a Washington Post reporter's house happened on Wednesday as part of the Trump administration's investigation of a leak.
MARTÍNEZ: NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik joins us. David, all right, load us down with some details.
DAVID FOLKENFLIK, BYLINE: Well, as The Washington Post itself has reported, this stems from the government's case against a contractor named Aurelio Perez-Lugones. He was charged in Maryland by federal authorities with unlawfully retaining national defense information. The Post reporter involved is Hannah Natanson. Her home yesterday morning in Virginia was searched. Law enforcement agents seized two computers, one of which was her own personal computer, her Garmin smartwatch. She's been dubbed by a colleague at the Post the federal government whisper over the course of the past year. She's really documented the purge of hundreds of thousands of federal employees, completely reshaping the federal workforce.
And last month, she wrote this first-person story about this process, how depleting it was, but how fulfilling the mission was. And she said she relied on 1,169 confidential sources, people whose lives were upended. Yesterday, over the course of the day, the executive editor, Matt Murray, wrote about the profound concerns about this. He said the institution was standing behind her and encouraged reporters to do their constitutionally protected duties, that is, to report. There were also strong statements from the publisher and from the editorial page as well.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. So what does the government have to say about this?
FOLKENFLIK: Well, according to The Washington Post, the government has told the newspaper that Natanson is not a focus of the investigation, but I will say, once news got out, FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X that Natanson allegedly had obtained and reported, quote, "classified, sensitive military information from a government contractor - endangering our warfighters and compromising America's national security." And that's stern stuff. He's focusing the attention on what she did as opposed to what the person - the contractor that they have charged, allegedly, with having held onto this information illegally, what he did. Now, there are protections for journalists against prosecutors on both the federal and local level just rooting around in reporters' records to figure out where leaks came from. But there are exemptions, including from national security, and that's obviously what federal authorities, including the attorney general, are pointing to right here.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. And why are press advocates alarmed by all this?
FOLKENFLIK: Well, first off, this is highly unusual and considered incredibly aggressive to search a reporter's home instead of going to the office, and particularly instead of giving a subpoena to allow employers and news organizations to comply or to fight that. I talked yesterday to a bunch of media executives and First Amendment lawyers, and I think that what they felt in some was encapsulated by the former executive editor of The Washington Post. That's Marty Baron. Here's what he had to say.
MARTY BARON: There's a whole pattern in this administration of trying to undermine an independent press in this country and impede their work one way or another.
FOLKENFLIK: And why would he say that? Well, the pattern includes lawsuits filed against The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, ABC, CBS, the BBC by President Trump as an individual. His top broadcast regulator has launched investigations of CBS and PBS and NPR and NBC. There's been pressure of the corporate owners of CNN, The Washington Post and CBS. President Trump himself has repeatedly called for journalists who won't reveal their sources to be threatened with jail. And one more thing, given what Natanson wrote last month and all those 1,169 confidential sources, is this only about Perez-Lugones, or is this a fishing expedition seeking information about who made leaks beyond the case in Maryland?
MARTÍNEZ: That's NPR's David Folkenflik. David, thank you.
FOLKENFLIK: You bet. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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