A federal judge has rejected the Justice Department’s request to search the seized devices of a Washington Post reporter as part of an FBI investigation into leaked classified documents.
In a 22-page opinion issued Tuesday, U.S. Magistrate Judge William Porter of the Eastern District of Virginia criticized the government’s handling of the case, reversing course in part after previously authorizing the seizure of the reporter’s devices.
Porter previously approved a warrant that led federal agents to seize two laptops, a recorder, a portable hard drive, and a Garmin watch belonging to reporter Hannah Natanson in a pre-dawn raid at her Virginia home.
In his ruling, Porter concluded that the government could not be trusted to conduct a review of the devices on its own. He denied the Justice Department’s request to allow a government filter team to search the devices for materials relevant to its probe into Aurelio Luis Perez-Lugones, a government contractor who had top-level security clearances and was charged last month with illegally retaining classified documents.
Instead, the judge ordered that the court itself would review the reporter’s seized devices and flag any information relevant to the FBI’s probe.
The judge’s ruling marks an embarrassing setback for Attorney General Pam Bondi and her department as it carries out its investigation into the contractor, whom President Donald Trump has identified as a “leaker” who divulged classified information regarding Venezuela and shared it with the Washington Post reporter.
Perez-Lugones and Natanson exchanged messages prior to his arrest, federal prosecutors allege. Natanson wrote about ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a Jan. 9 story that cited government documents. Natanson isn’t accused of any wrongdoing.
“Given the documented reporting on government leak investigations and the government’s well chronicled efforts to stop them, allowing the government’s filter team to search a reporter’s work product — most of which consists of unrelated information from confidential sources — is the equivalent of leaving the government’s fox in charge of the Washington Post’s henhouse,” Porter wrote.
“The concern that a filter team may err by neglect, by malice, or by honest difference of opinion is heightened where its institutional interests are so directly at odds with the press freedom values at stake.”
The Washington Post, in a statement, said “we applaud the court’s recognition of core First Amendment protections.”
Porter had previously prohibited prosecutors from examining any of the items taken during the pre-dawn raid, in a major blow to Bondi and the Justice Department.
“The government must preserve but must not review any of the materials that law enforcement seized… until the Court authorizes review of the materials by further order,” he ordered on Jan. 21.
The Daily Beast has contacted the Justice Department for comment.
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