By Brian Stelter, CNN
(CNN) — The New York Times has taken legal action to challenge unusual subpoenas issued to several of its reporters last week.
The subpoenas, which attempt to compel the reporters to testify before a grand jury about their anonymous sources, were “abusive and improper” and should be quashed by a court, the Times’ top newsroom lawyer, David McCraw, said in a statement Wednesday night.
“As we set out in our motion, these subpoenas are brought in bad faith to punish The Times for its coverage,” McCraw said. “They violate the constitutional rights of The Times and its journalists.”
The demands for testimony were delivered just two days after The Times published a story contradicting President Donald Trump’s claims about the new Qatari-gifted Air Force One.
News reporting about the new plane’s security deficiencies angered the president and triggered a sprawling leak investigation. CNN reported new details about the leak hunt earlier on Wednesday.
When The Times revealed that several of its reporters had been subpoenaed, the Justice Department responded by saying that “reporters are not the targets; those leaking classified information are.”
Todd Blanche, Trump’s pick for attorney general, defended the investigative process at a Senate confirmation hearing. Blanche confirmed that he authorized the subpoenas and likened the reporters to “material witnesses, just like a reporter would be a material witness to a car crash. They are witnesses.”
Some conservative groups have similarly justified the subpoenas, while progressives have argued that the government is trying to unduly punish leakers who undermined Trump’s claims and journalists who shared what the leakers said.
Subpoenas are often shrouded in secrecy, and McCraw noted that his motion “was delivered under seal, pursuant to court order,” meaning it is hidden from the public.
“The Times believes that the public has a right to information about this case and is also seeking to have the papers unsealed,” McCraw said.
The subpoenas to the Times, issued last Friday, originally called for the reporters to testify before a grand jury on Wednesday.
But that did not happen on Wednesday as the news organization mounted its legal challenge.
The Times has asserted that US law protects journalists from retaliation, which it believes this case represents. A wide array of First Amendment groups and news media advocates have backed up The Times.
The newsroom’s executive editor, Joe Kahn, said Wednesday that “we see this… as an attempt to intimidate the journalists and The Times itself, and we’re going to continue to report — both about Air Force One, and on the circumstances around the government use of prosecutorial power to intimidate the independent news media.”
“I’ve been a foreign correspondent in China,” Kahn added in an online video, “and I’ve seen the way an authoritarian government can keep journalists from reporting on a huge amount of news and information that’s very clearly in the public interest. It’s really essential to American democracy that that kind of erosion of press freedoms not happen here.”
On Wednesday morning, the attorney who signed the subpoenas also addressed the matter, albeit not in detail. Jay Clayton, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, was pressed about it by several Democratic senators during a confirmation hearing. Clayton is in line to become director of national intelligence.
“It’s not even clear that the subpoenas that you signed followed the administration’s policy, which requires the government to first make all reasonable attempts to obtain information from other sources,” Sen. Ron Wyden said.
Clayton refused to get into specifics but said “we followed the processes that we’re required to follow,” including those “we have in place to protect the First Amendment and protect the freedom of the press.”
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