Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said Tuesday that reporters should not be surprised if they receive subpoenas over information tied to national security-sensitive stories, sharpening a Justice Department push to go after leakers who share classified material with the press.
Blanche said prosecuting people who leak the nation’s secrets is a priority for the administration and added that any witness, whether a reporter or someone else, who has information about those crimes should expect a subpoena. “Should not be surprised,” he said.
The warning lands after The reported Monday that it received subpoenas in March tied to a Feb. 23 article about military officials warning President Donald Trump about the risks of carrying out military action against Iran. According to the Journal, Trump later pressed Blanche to take a harder line on leaks related to the war.
The Journal also reported that Trump at one point slid Blanche a list of articles with a sticky note reading, “Treason.” The detail underscored how aggressively the leak inquiry has moved inside the administration and how closely the president has tracked the case.
A Justice Department spokesperson told News that, in all circumstances, the department follows the facts and applies the law to identify those committing crimes against the United States. Blanche had already said at a news conference that the department would move forward with directly targeting reporters with subpoenas.
The dispute is unfolding against the backdrop of a broader leak investigation tied to coverage of the war in Iran. Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department had stricter rules for using compulsory legal action against reporters, but Pam Bondi rescinded those guidelines last year. That shift matters because it removes a barrier that once made it harder for prosecutors to compel journalists to turn over information about their sources.
Media outlets and First Amendment advocates saw Blanche’s comments as a break with recent precedent, and the language he used left little doubt about the direction of travel. For reporters covering national security, the message was blunt: the department now appears prepared to treat access to source information as part of its criminal hunt, not as a line prosecutors should hesitate to cross.
What happens next is whether the leak investigation widens beyond the Journal’s reporting and into more subpoenas for journalists or others with knowledge of how the information moved. Blanche has signaled that the administration is ready to use that power, and his warning suggests the next notice may not be the last.
