WASHINGTON — The US government said Saturday it would stop secretly obtaining reporters’ phone and email records during investigations into political leaks, ending a practice that was often criticized as undermining press freedom.
The New York Times this week reported that under Donald Trump’s administration and continuing under President Joe Biden, the Justice Department fought a covert legal battle to access email logs of four of its reporters in a hunt for leak sources.
The Department of Justice said in a statement that “in a change to its longstanding practice — (it) will not seek compulsory legal process in leak investigations to obtain source information from members of…
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