A federal appeals court blocked the Trump administration from accessing a group of journalists’ LinkedIn records, calling the request “overbroad” in a Tuesday decision.
The three-judge panel sent the matter back to a lower court and instructed it to draw its orders “more narrowly” — though it did uphold the government’s right to vigorously investigate leaks that it claims could endanger national security.
The Justice Department was seeking LinkedIn metadata records from six journalists, a demand that covers close to 1,900 interactions over an 18-month period, according to Politico. While specific details about the case — including which stories the government is investigating — are still under seal, the appeals court revealed that the targeted journalists published nearly 1,000 articles during that time, with less than 5% having anything to do with the national security leak the government presented.
In a unanimous decision, Judge Harvie Wilkinson, a Reagan appointee, wrote that while the federal government is “entitled to discovery to the full extent permitted by law” and even a “broad disclosure order,” the administration cannot seek records “carte blanche.”
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“We understand what the incentives are for the government to want a thorough investigation of a leak on a matter so self-evidently tied to national security concerns. To a considerable extent, the government is entitled to have its desire respected. But respect does not translate into license to round up indiscriminately the identities of confidential and unrelated newsgathering sources,” Wilkinson wrote.
LinkedIn initially challenged the Justice Department’s November 2025 demands in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, which ruled in favor of the Trump administration in June. The company then appealed to the 4th Circuit.
Tuesday’s decision deemed aspects of the federal government’s request “substantially overbroad” and sent the case back to district court. Wilkinson ostensibly agreed with the “rightful respect” the lower court gave the government’s national security interests in this case, but the appeals panel sided with LinkedIn’s call for the Justice Department to defend the breadth of its request.
By allowing the DOJ’s sweeping demand to proceed, the appeals court said that LinkedIn, a popular platform for journalists, could suffer “both reputational and financial harm.”
“Without confidentiality, the ability of journalists to report on events of large importance and governmental behavior of dubious legality and integrity could not help but be hampered,” Wilkinson wrote. “Access to sources inside an agency is essential where the press seeks to ensure public accountability from the often-opaque bureaucracies that today define the executive function.”
The DOJ has also barred LinkedIn from divulging any details about the case to the affected users for at least one year — a secrecy order the appeals court said poses an “obvious” risk to both the journalists and their news outlets’ First Amendment rights by keeping them “entirely in the dark.”
President Donald Trump has made several efforts to crack down on executive branch officials leaking information to journalists — including sweeping polygraph tests across several departments as well as issuing subpoenas to journalists. Federal agents even raided the home of a Washington Post reporter in January.
The president has also referred to those who leak information to the press as “the scum of the earth” and has called for them to be shot.
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