Federal agents seized a phone, two laptops, a recorder, a portable hard drive, and a Garmin smartwatch from reporter Hannah Natanson’s Virginia home during a search on January 15, according to a court filing. The Washington Post said the seized material spanned years of Natanson’s reporting across hundreds of stories, including communications with confidential sources.
The search targeted the Post’s coverage of the Trump administration’s transformation of the federal government. A warrant indicated the search was related to an investigation of Pentagon contractor Aurelio Luis Perez-Lugones, who was arrested earlier in January on a charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents.
The Washington Post said the seizure violated Natanson’s First Amendment rights and legal safeguards protecting journalists’ work materials. “The outrageous seizure of our reporter’s confidential newsgathering materials chills speech, cripples reporting, and inflicts irreparable harm every day the government keeps its hands on these materials,” the Post said in a statement Wednesday.
The newspaper asked the federal court in Alexandria to order the immediate return of all seized materials and to bar the government from using any of it. “Anything less would license future newsroom raids and normalize censorship by search warrant,” the Post’s court filing states.
A magistrate judge in Alexandria temporarily blocked the government from reviewing the seized materials. The court scheduled a hearing for February 6 to consider the newspaper’s request for return of the devices.
Attorney General Pam Bondi defended the search, saying it was conducted at the request of the Defense Department. “The journalist was obtaining and reporting classified and illegally leaked information from a Pentagon contractor,” Bondi said.
Perez-Lugones, a U.S. Navy veteran who resides in Maryland, has not been charged with sharing classified information or accused in court papers of leaking, according to Justice Department filings. The charge against him is unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents.
The case comes as Bondi has moved to expand the government’s investigative tools for leak investigations. In April, she issued new guidelines restoring prosecutors’ authority to use subpoenas, court orders, and search warrants to hunt for government officials who make unauthorized disclosures to journalists. The new guidelines rescinded a Biden-administration policy that protected journalists from having their phone records secretly seized during leak investigations.
Bruce Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, called the search unprecedented and warned of broader consequences. “The unprecedented search of the reporter’s home imperils public interest reporting and will have ramifications far beyond this specific case,” Brown said in a statement. “It is critical that the court blocks the government from searching through this material until it can address the profound threat to the First Amendment posed by the raid.”