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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Washington, D.C., June 8, 2026 — Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) filed a federal Freedom of Information Act lawsuit today against the U.S. Department of Justice to uncover whether the agency is systematically misrepresenting the law and hiding statutory press protections from federal judges so that it can secure search warrants against journalists.

The lawsuit, filed with assistance from Free Information Group, follows the DOJ’s failure to disclose records regarding the unprecedented Jan. 14 FBI raid on Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s home. These include whether the agency has adopted an internal practice of hiding from magistrate judges the existence of the Privacy Protection Act of 1980 — which outlaws raids on newsrooms and journalists’ homes — to evade judicial scrutiny during leak investigations.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Gordon D. Kromberg previously admitted he knew of the PPA, but claimed he was following “department policy” by omitting it during the Natanson warrant process, a move that prompted FPF to file a formal bar complaint against him.

In February, a federal judge blocked the government from searching Natanson’s devices, stating the DOJ’s choice to withhold information about the PPA from the court “seriously undermined the Court’s confidence in the government’s disclosures.”

Magistrate Judge William Porter also placed the search in a larger pattern of retaliation against the press and of “purging employees perceived as disloyal” at DOJ, the Department of Defense, and the Department of Homeland Security.

“The Department of Justice’s decision to hide controlling federal law from a court to execute a midnight raid on a journalist’s home is a terrifying overreach that threatens the core of investigative journalism,” said Seth Stern, chief of advocacy for FPF. “By burying the Privacy Protection Act, the DOJ circumvented explicit statutory safeguards designed to protect reporters and their sources from administrative intimidation.”

“The DOJ’s flagrant disregard for press freedom is compounded by the administration’s attack on transparency and disregard for FOIA,” said Lauren Harper, FPF’s Daniel Ellsberg chair on government secrecy. “To date, the DOJ has failed to provide a single document, forcing us to go to court to access this urgent information.”

“The DOJ’s actions during the search of Hannah Natanson’s home, especially its misrepresentations to the judge, set a dangerous precedent. The public deserves to know whether this is just a one-time omission, or if it is the agency’s official policy to hide relevant law from judges,” said Ginger Quintero-McCall, a partner at Free Information Group.

Read the complaint here.

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