Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Press Freedom topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
President defends pursuing leakers; says administration is 'not after journalists'
Summary
In response to a question about subpoenas to journalists, the president said the administration's focus was finding leakers and defended legal measures to identify unauthorized disclosures, citing national-security concerns; reporters pressed on whether family members of journalists could be subpoenaed.
A reporter asked whether the president supported subpoenas to journalists after the Justice Department withdrew subpoenas to a New York Times journalist the previous night. The president said, "We're not after journalists. We're after leakers," and argued that when national-security information is leaked, identifying the source can require legal tools.
When asked specifically whether family members of journalists could be subpoenaed in such investigations, the president responded that he did not know "what's appropriate" in every case and said such steps had been taken by previous administrations. He defended efforts to find leakers tied to national-security disclosures and cited prior instances he said were handled similarly.
The exchange recorded the president's position and reporters' follow-ups; the briefing did not include further Justice Department statements or legal filings to substantiate the invocation of subpoenas.
