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The FBI executed a search warrant at the home of a Washington Post reporter this week as part of an investigation into a federal employee who is suspected of mishandling classified information, Attorney General Pam Bondi said.
In a statement, Bondi said the warrant was executed at the request of the Pentagon.
“The leaker is currently behind bars,” she said. “I am proud to work alongside Secretary Hegseth on this effort. The Trump Administration will not tolerate illegal leaks of classified information that, when reported, pose a grave risk to our Nation’s national security and the brave men and women who are serving our country.”
FBI Director Kash Patel confirmed on social media that law enforcement executed the search warrant Wednesday and alleged the journalist had received “classified, sensitive military information from a government contractor — endangering our warfighters and compromising America’s national security. The alleged leaker was arrested this week and is in custody. As this is an ongoing investigation, we will have no further comment.”
The decision to execute a search warrant at the home of a journalist is highly unusual, and could escalate the already tense relationship between the media and the Trump administration.
It was unclear why the Justice Department felt the need to search the home of a reporter even though the target of the investigation has already been charged and detained.
The FBI conducted the search at the Alexandria, Virginia, home of reporter Hannah Natanson, who writes about the federal workforce for the newspaper, according to the Washington Post.
Natanson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
According to The Washington Post, the warrant shows the investigation is targeting Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a system administrator in Maryland who holds a top secret security clearance.
Perez-Lugones, a government contractor in Annapolis, Maryland, and former member of the U.S. Navy, was already charged on Jan. 8 in a criminal complaint with violating the Espionage Act for unlawfully retaining national defense information.
Perez-Lugones, who holds a top secret security clearance, is accused of accessing a classified report related to an unnamed foreign country, taking a screen shot and printing it.
He also allegedly accessed another report related to a government operational activity and took notes on a yellow notepad.
During a search of his Laurel, Maryland, home and car that same day, the FBI found a document marked as “secret” in his lunchbox, the criminal complaint says. More documents marked as “secret” were also discovered in his basement, the complaint said.
A hearing in Perez-Lugonez’s case has been scheduled for Thursday in Baltimore.
A spokesperson for the Post said that the paper is reviewing and monitoring the situation.
