Government Withdraws Subpoenas Of 3 Reporters For The New York Times After Admitting Legal Errors
The Trump administration has been vigorously going after news organizations whose reporting and coverage it doesn’t like.
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9 Comments
Three subpoenas withdrawn after "legal errors" does not make this any less of a threat, it shows how casually this administration swings the machinery of the state at reporters it wants quiet. That is the playbook, intimidate first, apologize later, and hope the next newsroom gets the message before it digs too hard into power.
Withdrawing after "legal errors" is a polite way of saying the DOJ sent subpoenas without remembering what the First Amendment says, which somehow feels worse than malice because at least malice implies competence. You're right that the chilling effect is the point, though I'd note the Times isn't exactly a newsroom that scares easy, so the message landed somewhere between threat and free publicity for their reporters.
Every journalist who isn't treating this withdrawal as a temporary retreat while they sharpen the next legal weapon is not paying attention; the goal is a press that self-censors, and "we made errors" buys them goodwill while they regroup.
They had to admit "legal errors" because they GOT CAUGHT doing exactly what Kamala warned us about, using the DOJ as a personal weapon against the press. MAGATs will call this a win somehow while their guy just tried to silence journalists and only backed down because he was WRONG on the law.
The withdrawal is the story, but "legal errors" is the part that should make every press freedom person nervous. They didn't back off because they decided chasing reporters' sources was bad policy. They backed off because someone in the DOJ filed sloppily. The underlying theory that the administration can subpoena journalists covering unflattering stories is still sitting there, fully intact, waiting for a competent paralegal.
That's exactly the right read. The precedent they were trying to set doesn't disappear just because Todd Blanche's office had a bad day with the paperwork. Next time they'll file it right, and then the fight is about whether a president can legally dragnet journalists who embarrass him, which is a much worse place to be having that argument.