The FBI has reportedly subpoenaed a freelance reporter over his report on a secret U.S. mission in North Korea.
FBI agents delivered the subpoena, issued by prosecutors in Virginia, to Matthew Cole’s home in New York in February, and demanded he hand over two years of contacts and sources, the New York Times reported, citing anonymous sources. Coles had been working as a freelance reporter for the publication.
In 2025, Cole and staff reporter Dave Philipps reported on a Navy SEAL Team 6 mission in 2019 that led to the death of two or three unarmed North Koreans. Cole and Philipps cited two dozen unnamed sources to uncover the mission, which was undertaken to plant a listening device near North Korea’s coast.
The incident raises questions about press freedom and the Trump administration’s approach to the first amendment. It follows a string of other similar incidents in which the government has approached journalists and asked them for their sources.
Cole “has dedicated his professional life to bringing official misconduct to light and informing the public about the workings of its government,” his lawyer, David A O’Neil, said in a statement issued to the New York Times.
He added that his client “will not be intimidated from continuing that important work. He will defend press freedom and the First Amendment from this administration’s brazen attacks on journalists, and he will honor his commitment to his sources.”
“We support Matthew Cole’s decision to make public a subpoena that the government has attempted to keep secret,” New York Times spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said in a statement to Reuters.
Other Journalist Subpoenas
There have been multiple cases of journalists receiving subpoenas under the Trump Administration.
In July, federal agents delivered grand jury subpoenas, in some cases at their homes to four New York Times journalists—Julian E. Barnes, Eric Lipton, Tyler Pager, and Eric Schmitt. Those were issued just days after the publication reported that the Secret Service had urged President Donald Trump to leave Turkey aboard an older jet rather than his new Qatari-gifted Air Force One.
The Justice Department later withdrew those subpoenas.
“The subpoenas are an extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations and have a chilling effect on the work of journalists across the country,” Jodie Ginsberg, CEO of the Committee to Protect Journalists, said at the time.
“They have used the levers of power to intimidate and demonize professional journalists who report stories that are unfavorable to the administration’s desired narrative,” added Frank Sesno, a former CNN White House bureau chief who is now a media and public affairs professor at George Washington University.
In June, the Justice Department also withdrew subpoenas it had issued that sought to compel reporters at The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal to testify before a grand jury, according to people familiar with the matter.
In March, the Trump administration asked for records from reporters at the Wall Street Journal, seeking sources about a February article that described internal discussions in the administration about the war with Iran and the risks it would pose.
President Trump has said that these investigations are focused on officials leaking information rather than the media. He told reporters, “We’re not after journalists. We’re after leakers.”
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