Justice Department says it will resume practice of obtaining reporters records in leak inquiries

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department is cracking down on leaks of information to the news media, with Attorney General Pam Bondi saying prosecutors will once again have authority to use subpoenas, court orders and search warrants to hunt for government officials who make “unauthorized disclosures” to journalists.New regulations announced by Bondi in a memo to the staff obtained by The Associated Press on Friday rescind a Biden administration policy that protected journalists from having their phone records secretly seized during leak investigations — a practice long decried by news organizations and press freedom groups.The new regulations assert that news organizations must respond to subpoenas “when authorized at the appropriate level of the Department of Justice” and also allow for prosecutors to use court orders and search warrants to “compel production of information and testimony by and relating to the news media.”The memo says members of the press are “presumptively entitled to advance notice of such investigative activities,” and subpoenas are to be “narrowly drawn.”Warrants must also include “protocols designed to limit the scope of intrusion into potentially protected materials or newsgathering activities,” the memo states.“The Justice Department will not tolerate unauthorized disclosures that undermine President Trump’s policies, victimize government agencies, and cause harm to the American people,” Bondi wrote.Under the new policy, before deciding whether to use intrusive tactics against the news media, the attorney general is to evaluate whether there’s a reasonable basis to believe that a crime has been committed and that the information the government is seeking is needed for prosecution.Also, deciding whether prosecutors have first made reasonable attempts to “obtain the information from alternative sources” and whether the government has first “pursued negotiations with the affected member of the news med...