Trump defends DOJ subpoenas of NY Times reporters; Google also targeted in leak probe

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026 in Washington, DC. Eric Lee | Getty Images

President Donald Trump on Friday defended his Department of Justice's issuance of subpoenas to New York Times reporters, as it was revealed that Google also received a subpoena in the same criminal investigation into the leak of information about the president's new Air Force One plane.

Background on the Subpoenas

Trump's comments came a day after the DOJ told a New York federal judge it was withdrawing those subpoenas for grand jury testimony by Times reporters and their phone records. The DOJ is investigating the leak of concerns about security measures on the president's Qatari-donated plane, which the Times reported on earlier in July.

Judge Arun Subramanian had warned prosecutors on Thursday that if they did not voluntarily withdraw the subpoenas, he would quash them.

Trump's Remarks

"We're not after journalists," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Friday. "We're after leakers. We're after people that are cowards, people that are unpatriotic, people that are treasonous in many cases."

"And the way you find them is through journalists," the president said.

"That person should be found, and the way you find them is to tell the journalist, if it's something having to do with national security, you tell the journalist: 'Who is it?' " Trump said.

"And we have a long way to go with that case," he added.

Google's Involvement

At around the same time Trump was speaking, a letter that Google's lawyers sent Friday to Subramanian was unsealed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan on the judge's order.

The letter revealed that Google on July 16 was issued a subpoena from a grand jury at the DOJ's request, seeking "subscriber information associated with a phone number."

The subpoena was sent to Google one day after lawyers for the Times moved to quash subpoenas issued to their reporters.

Google also received on July 16 an order not to disclose to the phone number subscriber that it had received a subpoena for their information.

Legal Challenge to Non-Disclosure Order

In their letter on Friday, Google's lawyers asked Subramanian to vacate the non-disclosure order (NDO), which had been signed by a magistrate judge, arguing that the order violates the First Amendment of the Constitution, which establishes the right to free speech.

"The government has admitted that, at the time of its application for the NDO, it 'inadvertently included language that the investigation was "not public" when the fact of the investigation was public,' " the letter said.

Subramanian granted the request to vacate the NDO, a court filing shows.

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