Trump DOJ FOLDS before Judge LAYS DOWN THE HAMMER!!!

Attorneys Brian Kabateck and Shant Karnikian cover the DOJ's retreat in its leak investigation against New York Times reporters. Judge Arun Subramanian gave prosecutors a choice: withdraw the subpoenas or he'd quash them. They withdrew. The subpoenas targeted three reporters who wrote about security deficiencies on Trump's Qatari-donated 747, the story that forced Trump to fly the old Air Force One home from Turkey. Subramanian spent an hour dismantling the DOJ's case. "Subpoenas are the last step, not the first step," he said, citing DOJ's own guidelines on subpoenaing journalists, which prosecutors apparently ignored. He then hauled the prosecutor who signed the affidavit into court and made him explain why the application to a different judge omitted that the targets were journalists acting in their capacity as journalists. The subpoenas also swept up phone records of reporters' spouses and one reporter's mother. Prosecutors called those "errors" from "trying to move quickly." The DOJ's response after losing: they criticized the judge, said his conduct "overrides clear longstanding principles and common sense," and insisted the investigation continues. Brian and Shant predicted this outcome. The chilling effect was the point: agents showing up at reporters' homes on a Friday night sends a message to every journalist in the country, even if the subpoenas don't survive Monday morning.

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