Associated Press's president said the department broke its own rules with the seizure. | REUTERS AP boss: Sources won't talk anymore

Associated Press president Gary Pruitt on Wednesday slammed the Department of Justice for acting as “judge, jury and executioner” in the seizure of the news organization’s phone records and he said some of the wire service’s longtime sources have clammed up in fear.

Pruitt said the department broke its own rules with the seizure, which he said was too broad, and by failing to give the AP notice of the subpoena. Pruitt questioned the DoJ’s actions concerning the subpoena — had the DoJ come to the news organization in advance, “we could have helped them narrow the scope of the subpoena” or a court could have decided, he said.


“There was never that opportunity,” Pruitt said during a speech at the National Press Club in D.C. “Instead the DoJ acted as judge, jury and executioner in private, in secret.”

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The AP reported in May the Department of Justice had secretly obtained records that listed incoming and outgoing calls in April and May of 2012 and the duration of those calls for work and personal phone numbers of AP reporters and phone lines for AP offices in New York, Hartford, Conn., and Washington. The seizure also included the main number for AP reporters in the House of Representatives press gallery.

The government seized records, which listed incoming and outgoing calls and the call’s length, for more than 20 separate lines assigned to the AP and its reporters during the time the AP was reporting on a foiled terror plot by Al Qaeda in Yemen. After the DOJ informed the AP — the regulation requires the department to give notice within 90 days — Pruitt called the move a “massive and unprecedented intrusion.”

Since the disclosure of the DoJ’s subpoena, Pruitt on Wednesday said AP reporters have experienced a chilling effect on newsgathering. Sources are “nervous and anxious” about talking with reporters, he said, and it goes beyond just the AP. “What I learned from our journalists should alarm everyone in this room and should alarm everyone in this country,” he said.

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“The actions of the DoJ against AP are already having an impact beyond the specifics of this particular case,” he said. “Some of our longtime trusted sources have become nervous and anxious about talking to us, even on stories that aren’t about national security. And in some cases, government employees that we once checked in with regularly will no longer speak to us by phone, and some are reluctant to meet in person.”

“This chilling effect is not just at AP, it’s happening at other news organizations as well,” Pruitt added. “Journalists from other news organizations have personally told me it has intimidated sources from speaking to them. Now, the government may love this. I suspect they do. But beware the government that loves secrecy too much.”

While the AP is not going to be “intimidated,” by the DoJ’s action, he said, “our sources will be.”

The AP is now looking to the department’s review of its guidelines — President Barack Obama has directed Attorney General Eric Holder to report to him about this by July 12 — as it moves forward in dealing with this seizure, Pruitt said. The AP is looking for the department to recognize the right of the press to get advance notice in subpoenas of records, for judicial oversight, updated guidelines that take into consideration the Internet era, a federal shield law and to formally institutionalize that the Justice Department will “not prosecute any journalist for doing his or her job.”

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As for the AP’s next steps internally, Pruitt said the organization is looking into new encryption and security protections for their reporting and sources. The AP is examining its contracts with its phone service providers and looking at its encryption and security online more than ever before, he noted.

“We’re doing that generally because of hackers,” he said. “We’re looking very vigilantly at secrecy and protecting our newsgathering efforts and protecting anonymity of our sources and protection of our records. We’re probably doing that more than we’ve ever done before.”