Justice Dept. Policy Seeks to Make
Seizing Journalists’ Records Easier
The Justice Department is ramping up its confrontations against the media with a new policy that could make it easier for U.S. attorneys to seize reporters’ records and to compel their testimony.
In a related move, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia is threatening to revoke the nonprofit status of Wikipedia.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi sent out a memo to Justice Department officials late last month that reverses a policy protecting reporters’ sources when they report information leaked from unnamed sources.
The policy was derived from First Amendment free speech and free press guarantees. It has been in effect with only small modifications since the Nixon administration.
Bondi’s memo said the old policy interferes with law enforcement when issues of public importance are investigated.
Bondi’s memo lacks detail on what information might be seized from journalists but indicates the Justice Department could go beyond investigating leaks of classified information to include news reports that “undermine” Trump administration policies.
She said her policy would protect “classified, privileged and other sensitive information.”
She also appeared to authorize seizing records without the normal requirement of court hearings and warrants. Until now, senior Justice Department approvals were needed before attorneys seek court orders.
She said the Justice Department “will not tolerate unauthorized disclosures that undermine President Trump’s policies, victimize government agencies, and cause harm to the American people.”
Media representatives are implying the Justice Department should expect legal battles if they try to enforce Bondi’s policy.
“Strong protections for journalists serve the American public by safeguarding the free flow of information,” Bruce D. Brown, president of the media advocacy organization Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said in a statement. “We’ll wait to see what the policy looks like, but we know reporters will still do their jobs, and there is no shortage of legal support to back them up.”
Under the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause and Fourth Amendment privacy provisions, the Justice Department would need to prove to judges that a crime is likely to have been committed before they can get a warrant or subpoena witnesses in the media.
Bondi’s memo said the Justice Department would consider whether there are “reasonable grounds to believe that a crime has occurred and the information sought is essential to a successful prosecution” before seeking court orders.
Federal prosecutors also would need to make reasonable attempts to get the information without court intervention, such as by negotiating with journalists. Exceptions would be allowed for “a threat to national security, the integrity of the investigation or bodily harm,” the memo says.
Acting U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia Ed Martin also invoked national security when he sent a letter demanding information from the online news and information outlet Wikipedia on whether it complies with Internal Revenue Service guidelines for charitable organizations.
He said Wikipedia publishes “propaganda” that sometimes conflicts with the Trump administration’s efforts.
Martin’s letter sent to the nonprofit that runs Wikipedia said the tax-exempt organization was “allowing foreign actors to manipulate information and spread propaganda to the American public.”
He demanded information about its editorial processes and how it safeguards the integrity of its information.
“Wikipedia is permitting information manipulation on its platform, including the rewriting of key, historical events and biographical information of current and previous American leaders, as well as other matters implicating the national security and the interests of the United States,” Martin wrote. “Masking propaganda that influences public opinion under the guise of providing informational material is antithetical to Wikimedia’s ‘educational’ mission."
San Francisco-based Wikipedia advertises itself as the “free encyclopedia” that seeks accuracy and neutrality in its reports from volunteer contributors worldwide.
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.
Universities Prepare to Battle Trump
Over What They Say Is “Coercion”
Faculty and student leaders from at least six universities met recently at the University of Minnesota to decide whether to pool their resources for a legal battle with President Donald Trump.
They are outraged over what they say are Trump’s efforts to control their curricula, admissions policies and research funding.
Their proposed “mutual academic defense compact” resolution would allow them to share attorneys and financial resources to oppose the president’s effort that he describes as reforms.
Presidents of the universities co-signed a letter joined by about 200 school administrators addressed to Trump. It denounces the Trump administration for demanding more oversight of their educational programs.
“We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight. However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses,” says the letter.
The letter published by the American Association of Colleges and Universities was co-signed by the presidents of Georgetown University and American University.
Trump has criticized many universities for their diversity, equity and inclusion programs that seek ethnic and sexual orientation tolerance in admissions. He also has said they sometimes harbor hostile aliens enrolled as international students and overlook security concerns of Jewish students.
He has threatened to cut off federal funding to universities that do not comply with his demands for changes and government supervision.
The university administrators referred to what they said were Trump’s “coercive” tactics when they wrote, “Yet, American institutions of higher learning have in common the essential freedom to determine, on academic grounds, whom to admit and what is taught, how, and by whom.”
It also said their faculty, students, and staff should not need to fear “retribution, censorship, or deportation.”
Trump is showing no signs of backing down.
He signed an executive order last week that seeks to use the accrediting system for colleges to block what Trump calls discrimination in higher education. He was referring to policies that require tolerance of transgender students and admissions programs to recruit minority students.
Trump said the universities still could seek diversity but that it would be intellectual diversity rather than being based on race, sexual orientation or national origin.
He said the accrediting system is his “secret weapon” to reform higher education. Schools that decline to adopt his policies or to comply with his orders could lose accreditation.
At least 52 universities in 41 states are at risk of some kind of backlash from the Trump administration. They have been notified that they are being investigated by the U.S. Department of Education for their diversity, equity and inclusion programs that use "racial preferences and stereotypes in education programs and activities."
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.
FBI Reports Sharp Increase
In American Cybercrime Victims
The FBI’s new Internet Crime Report released last month shows Americans lost $16.6 billion to cybercrime in 2024 despite an intensified government effort to stop it.
The losses were up by one-third from a year earlier.
Residents of the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia were cheated out of a total of $848 million through cybercrime, the report says.
Fraud was the most common crime, particularly among elderly persons. It accounted for 83 percent of the financial losses. Ransomware attacks also were up.
The report coincides with warnings from the FBI that U.S. infrastructure is vulnerable to foreign attacks from China, Russia and transnational criminal hackers.
The statistics were derived largely from reports to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center.
The losses could have been much worse without the government’s intervention, according to the FBI.
Part of the U.S. effort against cybercrime was directed at LockBit, a cybercriminal group that sells ransomware to its customers. The FBI cites it as the world’s largest cybercrime network.
Software developed by the group enables malicious actors to carry out attacks by encrypting a victim’s data and demanding a ransom before they will decrypt – or unlock – their computers. If the information is private, they also threaten to leak it publicly unless they receive their ransom payment.
In the United States, LockBit software forced victims to pay about $91 million between January 2020 and May 2023, according to U.S. government reports.
The FBI tried to counter the LockBit attacks by distributing thousands of decryption keys to ransomware victims. The agency says the keys have helped to avoid about $800 million in ransomware payments.
“Also in 2024, we worked proactively to prevent losses and minimize victim harm through private sector collaboration and initiatives like Operation Level Up,” B. Chad Yarbrough, operations director for criminal and cyber at the FBI, wrote in the Internet Crime Report 2024. The FBI describes Operation Level Up as a proactive approach to identify and notify potential victims of cryptocurrency investment fraud .
In addition to ransomware and fraudulent financial appeals, cybercrime also commonly includes viruses, malware, data breaches and Denial of Service attacks.
The Internet Crime Complaint Center received 263,455 cybercrime complaints last year, the FBI reported.
The top five states for losses to cybercriminals were California at $2.5 billion; Texas at $1.3 billion; Florida at $1.1 billion; New York at $904 million; and Illinois at $479 million.
Maryland, Virginia and D.C. all ranked in the top 20. Maryland victims reported losses of $239 million; Virginia $317 million and D.C. $292 million.
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.
Maryland Laws Give Prison Inmates
New Parole and Expungement Chances
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed bills recently that would make it easier for prison inmates to get parole and to expunge their criminal records after being released.
He described the bills as a justice reform effort intended to give criminal offenders a second chance at success.
“We know, that for too many Marylanders, their criminal record … is tied around their necks for life. They cannot get a loan, they cannot get a home, they cannot get hired and oftentimes it’s because of an offense that they committed years, if not decades ago,” Moore (D) said. “We have got to confront this myth that every sentence needs to be a life sentence.”
The reforms expand the list of more than 100 mostly nonviolent crimes that qualify for expungement. They also streamline the process to make it easier and faster.
Additional offenses that could be expunged are credit card theft, making a false statement to police and driving without a license.
Other reform provisions would grant parole to more inmates imprisoned with long sentences. In addition, age and illness would be given greater consideration on whether to parole prisoners.
The key bills Moore signed into law are the Second Look Act and the Expungement Reform Act.
The Second Look Act would allow persons incarcerated for at least 20 years to petition for a reduced sentence if they were younger than 25 years old when they were convicted, they were not sex offenders, not sentenced to life without chance of parole, and were not convicted of killing first responders.
Both bills were subjects of emotional testimony in the Maryland General Assembly that included crime victims discussing how they were terrorized by criminals.
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.
D.C. Nets $900,000 in Crackdown
On Unpaid Traffic Tickets
The District of Columbia claims to have collected more than $900,000 in unpaid traffic tickets in a recent police enforcement campaign.
The city estimates about $1 billion is owed by scofflaws, many of them from Virginia and Maryland.
“Too many drivers think they can speed recklessly through the District, putting the safety of Washingtonians and visitors at risk, with no financial consequences for their lawlessness,” District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb said in a statement as he announced lawsuits against five motorists.
One of them, Charles V. Sanders Jr., allegedly owes $187,200 for 344 traffic infractions, including 316 citations for speeding. Sixty-one of them were for speeding more than 30 miles per hour over the speed limit.
The crackdown is being enabled by technology that reads the license plates of vehicles and simultaneously lists any fines the owners have not paid. It helps identify the “high-dollar scofflaws” who are the prime target.
The traffic enforcers travel in convoys of tow trucks with a lead car equipped with license plate-reading technology. Vehicles owing at least $2,000 in fines compel the convoy to stop long enough for one of the tow trucks to haul the scofflaw’s auto to an impound lot.
After the lot normally used for impounded vehicles filled to capacity, the city opened two more lots to handle the overflow. The owners have 28 days to pay their fines and get a clearance from police to reclaim their vehicles.
District of Columbia residents can be granted payment plans on their tickets to reclaim their vehicles. Out of state residents must pay the full amount due or their autos will be auctioned or scrapped.
More than half the vehicles towed have been from Virginia.
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.