Journalists Rally in Defense of Washington Post Reporter Raided by FBI

(Screengrab via X)

Colleagues and journalists from other outlets united in support of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson on Wednesday hours after the FBI searched her Virginia home and seized several of her devices as part of an investigation into the alleged mishandling of classified information.

Natanson was at home when agents arrived. According to the newspaper’s reporting, federal officers examined her devices before seizing a phone, a Garmin watch, and two laptops – one personal and one issued by her employer. Agents later told Natanson that she was not the target of the investigation.

In the hours after the news broke colleagues took to social media to declare they were “standing with” Natason and lauding her work, sharing links to past articles:

Speaking to CNN’s Reliable Sources newsletter one anonymous staffer praised Natanson as “a symbol of how, amid all the turnover and questions, the paper would still break news, still cover the Trump administration aggressively and still mint new stars.”

The newspaper’s owner, billionaire Jeff Bezos, has not publicly commented on the incident.

Journalists and commentators from other outlets also weighed in, including Semafor’s Dave Weigel and New Yorker’s Susan Glasser:

In further conversation with CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter, several Post staffers revealed that the FBI search had sent the newsroom “scrambling” to implement “additional precautions.”

“We’re horrified for Hannah, who’s a wonderful reporter, and scared for ourselves, trying to think through how best to further protect sources and secure our reporting and devices,” another said.

The Post reported that Wednesday’s FBI search was conducted in connection with a probe into a government contractor accused of illegally retaining classified materials.

An FBI affidavit, as described by the newspaper, links the warrant to an investigation of Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a Maryland-based system administrator with top-secret security clearance. He is accused of accessing classified intelligence reports and taking them home.

The search comes just weeks after Natanson published a first-person account reflecting on a year covering the federal workforce.

In the December piece, she described her role as “the federal government whisperer,” writing that she had been inundated with tips from civil servants affected by Trump’s sweeping overhaul of government — including 1,169 new Signal contacts who “decided to trust me with their stories.”