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Holder: New media guidelines in weeks

New guidelines on how the Justice Department can monitor the media will be published in the next coming weeks, Attorney General Eric Holder said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has been an advocate for media protections, noted that it has been more than six months since a report was given to President Barack Obama with proposed changes to the Department guidelines on criminal investigations that involve the news media.

Holder said he had hoped to have the guidelines done by the hearing but that there was a "glitch toward the end," though he didn't go into specifics.

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"I will say that in spite of the fact that they are not yet issued, we are working under them as if they were in place and we are also looking for people for the board that we are putting together as part of the review process," Holder said.

Holder was referring to two new bodies within the DOJ that would assist the Attorney General when it comes to investigating the media. One would be a "media review committee," that will assess the impact of the department's new media policies. The second is the "media dialogue group" involving outsiders who would assist the department periodically to review how the reforms are being implemented. The committee is expected to have their first meeting in February, Holder said.

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The review of the policy came after controversy last year over criminal leak investigations that included seizure of records of Associated Press phone calls and a search of an e-mail account of Fox News reporter James Rosen.

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