Trump suggests he could demand journalists reveal source of Iran intel leak

Washington Post

3 days ago

President Donald Trump has said he wants to prosecute those responsible for the leak of classified intelligence about U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, and suggested his government could pressure journalists who covered the leaked intelligence report to reveal their sources.
Several news outlets, citing people familiar with the preliminary assessment, said it found that the U.S. strikes set Iran's nuclear program back by months but did not eliminate it, contradicting Trump's claims that the strikes resulted in its 'obliteration.' In response, the Trump administration is investigating the leak and plans to limit how much classified intelligence it shares with Congress.
Here's what to know.
In his interview with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, Trump doubled down on his claim that Democrats were behind the leak related to the intelligence report.
'They should be prosecuted,' he added.
When asked whether his administration could find out the source of the leak, Trump said: 'If they wanted, they could find out easily. You go up and tell the reporter, 'National security, who gave it?' You have to do that. And I suspect we'll be doing things like that.'
The extent of the damage remains unclear, and assessments could change. But Trump and his officials have doubled down on their claims that the U.S. strikes devastated Tehran's nuclear program. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the bombing campaign 'obliterated Iran's ability to create nuclear weapons,' and Secretary of State Marco Rubio called it 'complete and total obliteration.'
Daniel Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference that the three sites 'sustained extremely severe damage and destruction,' citing initial battle damage assessments.
Meanwhile, Rafael Mariano Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations nuclear watchdog, said that the conflict between Israel and Iran, which culminated in the U.S. airstrikes, 'severely damaged several nuclear facilities in Iran.' Yet Grossi told CBS's 'Face the Nation' on Friday that Iran probably had the ability to resume uranium enrichment activities 'in a matter of months.' 'Frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there,' he said.
Some preliminary information has further complicated the picture of the impact of the operation. Classified briefings of U.S. senators left many Democratic lawmakers confused about the impact of the strikes. And the United States obtained intercepted communication between senior Iranian officials discussing the U.S. strikes and remarking that the attack was less devastating than they had expected, The Post reported, citing four people familiar with the classified intelligence circulating within the U.S. government.
The Trump administration strenuously disagreed with the Iranians' conclusions and cast doubt on their ability to assess the damage at the three facilities targeted in the U.S. mission. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt accused The Post of 'helping people commit felonies by publishing out-of-context leaks.'
Journalists sometimes rely on confidential sources in their reporting. This helps to protect sources from personal or professional consequences when they share secret information that is in the public interest. It can also happen when officials agree to speak about a sensitive topic only on the condition of anonymity.
'It's crucially important that journalists be able to credibly assure their sources that they'll be able to keep their identities secret, or else these stories just don't get told,' said Gabe Rottman, vice president of policy for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (RCFP).
Jason Shepard, a media law scholar at Cal State Fullerton, said that until the 1970s, there was an 'established view that journalists had an absolute right to protect the identity of their confidential sources.' Journalists who were subpoenaed as part of an investigation or ordered by a judge to reveal a confidential source typically 'said 'no,' and they got a slap on the wrist,' he said.
But in 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in Branzburg v. Hayes that the First Amendment does not give journalists the absolute right to withhold confidential information from a grand jury. This marked a turning point — but even then, Shepard said, 'hundreds of lower-court decisions interpreted Branzburg to give journalists a qualified privilege under the First Amendment.'
As a result, 'journalists have operated for many, many decades in a gray area about whether and under what circumstances the First Amendment gives them a right to protect their confidential sources,' he said.
While most states provide protections for journalists against being compelled to reveal confidential sources, sometimes known as shield laws, an effort to create a federal shield law has languished in the Senate. And even existing shield laws have exceptions that could force journalists to reveal their sources in some cases.
Trump's administration has waged a campaign against unauthorized leaks in his second term.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and her staff said in April on social media that she had referred 'two intelligence community leakers' to the Justice Department for potential prosecution, with a third referral on the way. One of the leaks included information published in a Post article on the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang, Gabbard aide Alexa Henning said on X. Three top aides to Hegseth were also removed amid an apparent inquiry into the leak of sensitive information, defense officials said.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence said it has been assisting with the FBI's recent investigations into leakers. The Defense Department declined to comment on an ongoing investigation.
Also in April, the Justice Department reversed a Biden-era policy that prevented officials from searching reporters' phone records when trying to identify government workers who leaked sensitive information. Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a memo about the rule change that she supports a free press and that the Justice Department would search reporters' communications only when other investigative tactics had been exhausted. She also said she must approve all attempts to question or arrest journalists.
'Leaking classified information is a crime, and anyone who threatens American national security in this manner should be held accountable,' said White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly.
Rottman said it's rare for the federal government to try to compel a journalist to reveal their source, adding that these types of cases are more likely to occur at a state and local level. But it's not unheard of.
In the 2000s, President George W. Bush and Barack Obama both subpoenaed New York Times reporter James Risen to try to compel him to reveal how he obtained classified information about the Central Intelligence Agency's Iran operations. Risen never agreed to reveal his sources, and after a years-long legal battle, the Justice Department abandoned its efforts to compel him to testify. And in 2005, New York Times reporter Judith Miller spent nearly three months in jail after she refused to reveal the identity of a confidential source to a grand jury investigating whether senior government officials leaked a CIA operative's name in retaliation against a critic of the Bush administration.
This issue is not 'purely partisan,' said Shepard, who pointed out that there were a number of leak investigations under Obama that 'raised serious questions about press freedom.' Obama's Justice Department was widely criticized by First Amendment advocates for secretly obtaining the telephone records of journalists working for the Associated Press as part of a wider investigation into the disclosure of classified information about a failed al-Qaeda plot in 2012.
According to the RCFP, dozens of journalists have been fined or jailed over the past 75 years for refusing to reveal their sources in the face of court orders or subpoenas.