Sam Stein

She's not the subject of the probe.

It makes sense to me that they would try to find out and try to get the information back.

And maybe so, but it's an incredibly chilling and aggressive move that is directly at odds with my interpretation of the freedom of the press.

We have the right to collect information that we then report on.

This reporter has been doing incredible work.

I've been very jealous of her because when we were doing a lot of the Doge reporting and we were getting a lot of people coming to us talking about what life was like in the federal government, I kept looking up and seeing the Post getting great scoop after great scoop after great scoop.

And what this will do in practical terms is it will send an incredible signal to anyone who's doing this type of reporting that you might get targeted by the government.

And it will also send a signal to every source out there, potential source out there, that the government's going to come after you.

I think that's obviously what the administration wants.

100%.

Now, it's important to get to the press response because you are right.

It's not unprecedented.

There have been cases in the past, including during the Obama administration.

My recollection is that during the Obama administration, when this did happen, there was a big outcry from throughout the industry, including from conservative publications.

about what was happening.

And so much so that the administration then put in place some standards outlined by Eric Holder, the attorney general at the time, that would more or less police how the Department of Justice could go about doing these things and gave some protections to reporters.

Those were, of course, not law.

They were standards.

And so Pam Bondi undid them.

But I'm not seeing that type of reaction now.