The Justice Department on Thursday withdrew the subpoenas that sought phone records and grand jury testimony from New York Times journalists who had reported on the security capabilities of President Trump’s new Qatari-donated Air Force One jet.
The government acted after a federal judge grilled Justice Department lawyers for nearly an hour over their handling of the subpoenas, which The Times had sought to quash. The news outlet called the subpoenas an effort to intimidate its reporters.
Judge Arun Subramanian, at a hearing in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, said the government was not prevented from subpoenaing the Times reporters again if it followed appropriate procedures.
The case was a high-profile instance of the Trump administration’s efforts to escalate pressure on independent news organizations. The government issued the subpoenas, some of which were delivered by federal agents at reporters’ homes, after Mr. Trump was angered by The Times’s disclosures about his new jet, which he had flown to Turkey this month and eagerly showed off.
Shortly after The Times published its reporting, the White House instructed Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to pursue a leak investigation to unmask confidential sources who had provided information to the newspaper about a national security matter.
On Thursday, Judge Subramanian zeroed in on whether the government had heeded the law and its own regulations on investigations involving the news media. He said subpoenas to reporters “are not the first thing you do — they are the last thing you do.”
“It’s a matter of basic compliance with the law,” he added.
After Thursday’s hearing, the Justice Department criticized Judge Subramanian, saying in a statement that his “conduct overrides clear longstanding principles and common sense.”
“Make no mistake, this investigation remains ongoing,” the Justice Department said, “and we will pursue justice against those threatening national security by leaking classified information, a serious federal crime.”
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
At Thursday’s hearing, on the 23rd floor of the federal courthouse in Manhattan, it was quickly apparent that Judge Subramanian was skeptical of the government’s approach. Within 10 minutes, he had laid out a stark choice to the Justice Department.
“Either we can quash the subpoenas, or you can withdraw the subpoenas,” the judge told Sean Buckley, a top official in the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan, who was speaking on behalf of the government.
Judge Subramanian then grilled the prosecutors for the vast majority of the hourlong hearing, his demeanor at times resembling a teacher scolding his pupils. He asked few questions of The Times’s lawyers; at one point, he even apologized to one of them and promised time to respond to some of the government’s statements.
Under the judge’s questioning, the government acknowledged factual errors in its filings. It conceded that it had omitted significant information — including that the case pertained to journalists’ records — when it asked a different federal judge to prevent a phone company from disclosing a record request.
“The inadvertent errors and the hindsight, that you should have done things differently, these things are piling up,” the judge said.
Mr. Buckley argued that the nature of The Times’s reporting on sensitive national security matters had allowed for an exception to standard procedures. But he struggled to identify the precise legal rationale for that exception when the judge pressed him.
Judge Subramanian appeared especially troubled by the government’s omission of relevant details from its request for the nondisclosure order from the other federal judge. Neither The Times nor Judge Subramanian would have been aware of that request had the government not volunteered it days later.
The prosecutor who handled that application, Kevin Sullivan, was seated in the gallery, but Judge Subramanian asked that he walk to the front of the courtroom to explain the irregularities.
“Are you going to do this again?” the judge asked Mr. Sullivan at the end of his questioning.
“No, Your Honor,” the prosecutor replied.
After the hearing, Judge Subramanian asked the government to provide him with its private communications regarding the application for the nondisclosure order, a sign that the judge may not be finished with the matter.
Mr. Buckley also acknowledged that the phone record subpoenas had inadvertently encompassed relatives of the Times reporters — including the mother of one and the spouses of two others — calling it an error and “a consequence of trying to move quickly.”
After an hour of questioning on Thursday, prosecutors abruptly asked for a break so they could confer with The Times’s lawyers. Ten minutes later, Mr. Buckley, who had left the courtroom while the other lawyers huddled, returned and announced that the government would withdraw its subpoenas.
The Times praised the outcome of the hearing. “Today’s proceeding was an important affirmation of our country’s commitment to a free press,” David McCraw, the paper’s top newsroom lawyer, said in a statement. “We are pleased that the government finally conceded that the subpoenas violated the law, but they should never have been issued in the first place.”
As the hearing wound down, Judge Subramanian asked a lawyer for The Times, David A. O’Neil of Debevoise & Plimpton, if he had anything to add.
Mr. O’Neil said the government’s conduct had been “replete with bad faith” and lamented a chilling effect that he said had affected the journalists’ ability to report.
“We dispute any allegation of bad faith,” Mr. Buckley said, “and I’ll just leave it at that.”
Judge Subramanian opened his mouth, as if to respond, then apparently thought better of it.
“Understood,” he said.
