Ali Watkins

Last updated

Ali Watkins
Born (1991-10-27) October 27, 1991 (age 32) [1] [2]
Berks County, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Alma mater Temple University
OccupationJournalist

Ali Watkins [3] is an American journalist who writes for The New York Times . [4] Along with two colleagues, she was a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for a body of work consisting 10 articles spanning from March 3, 2014, to July 14, 2014. [5] [6] Watkins has worked for a number of publications, including BuzzFeed , Politico, McClatchy, [7] The Huffington Post, [8] and the Philadelphia Daily News . [9]

Contents

Early life and education

Watkins was born and raised in Berks County, Pennsylvania and attended Fleetwood High School in Fleetwood, Pennsylvania. [10] She is a graduate of Temple University, where she was a news editor for The Temple News . [11]

Career

In 2014, while she was still a senior in college, Watkins broke a national story about the Central Intelligence Agency monitoring United States Senate computers while the Senate Intelligence Committee was preparing a report on the CIA's detention and interrogation program. [12] [13] For their work on the story, Watkins and two other journalists were named as finalists for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting. [5] Watkins' scoop was at the core of the 2019 movie The Report , but her role was "elided." [14]

Watkins' career progression has been characterized as "meteoric" by The Times of London [15] and "stunning" by The Washington Post , [16] and she has been called a "hotshot" by Fox News. [17] In April 2017, in what The New York Times called "a scoop that other news organizations scrambled to match" and The Washington Post said was a "big story," Watkins broke a story about the 2013 meetings between CIA asset Carter Page and a Russian spy. [18] [19]

For several years, Watkins' beat was the Senate Intelligence Committee. At The New York Times, where she was hired in December 2017, [18] Watkins covered national security [20] and law-enforcement agencies from its Washington, D.C. bureau until July 2018. [21]

In July 2018, the Times reassigned Watkins to the New York office, [22] [23] where she covers crime and law enforcement in New York City at the Times Metro desk. [24] [25] The Times explained the reasons for her reassignment: "We are troubled by Ali's conduct, particularly while she was employed by other news organizations [...] For a reporter to have an intimate relationship with someone he or she covers is unacceptable." [26] Watkins relocated to New York. [27]

Wolfe case

From December 2013 to December 2017, Watkins was in a romantic relationship with the former head of security for the Senate Intelligence Committee, James A. Wolfe. [28] [29] [30] The FBI opened an investigation into Wolfe after an April 2017 article by Watkins described contacts between Russian spies and Donald Trump policy adviser Carter Page, who had not been publicly identified in relation to those contacts and who was working for the CIA at the time of the meetings. [31] [32] [33] On October 15, 2018, Wolfe pleaded guilty to one count of lying to the FBI about his relationship with Watkins. [34] [32] Prosecutors alleged that Wolfe leaked to Watkins and three other reporters. [35] Watkins denied that Wolfe ever provided her classified information. [36] Watkins disclosed the relationship to her employers BuzzFeed News, The New York Times, [37] [38] and Politico; [39] however, McClatchy editors said they were ignorant of the relationship while Watkins was an intern and employee from mid-2013 through 2014. [40] Following the Wolfe relationship, Watkins dated another Senate Intelligence Committee staff member, which Politico, her employer at the time, has said she failed to disclose. [41]

Former New York Times editor Jill Abramson said “I hate the whole situation more than I can say,” because she had spent her whole career trying to combat the notion that successful female journalists sleep with their sources. [42] The Sydney Morning Herald reported that the case "bears a strong resemblance to the television drama House of Cards," of which it said Watkins was a fan. [43] In 2019, Erik Wemple of The Washington Post compared Watkins to Amanda Macias, [44] as did Stephen L. Miller of The Spectator . [45]

Operation Whistle Pig

In 2017, Jeffrey Rambo, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent working for the National Targeting Center, investigated Watkins, other journalists including Martha Mendoza, and NGOs while on an assignment to combat forced labor in the Congo. The operation was called "Whistle Pig" and in addition to its own database trawling [46] it got the CBP’s Counter Network Division to provide information about Watkins' mother and brother and links to their public profiles, as well as details of Watkin's domestic and international travel. Rambo met Watkins under the fictitious name Jack Bentley, but Watkins obtained his real name from a credit card receipt. Watkins perceived Rambo's approach as a threat. [47]

In 2021, Watkins said: “I’m deeply troubled at the lengths CBP and DHS personnel apparently went to try and identify journalistic sources and dig into my personal life.” [48] A few days later, CBP launched an investigation. [49]

Related Research Articles

Journalism scandals are high-profile incidents or acts, whether intentional or accidental, that run contrary to the generally accepted ethics and standards of journalism, or otherwise violate the 'ideal' mission of journalism: to report news events and issues accurately and fairly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence</span> Legislative committee

The United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is dedicated to overseeing the United States Intelligence Community—the agencies and bureaus of the federal government of the United States that provide information and analysis for leaders of the executive and legislative branches. The Committee was established in 1976 by the 94th Congress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Comey</span> Former director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (born 1960)

James Brien Comey Jr. is an American lawyer who was the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2013 until his termination in May 2017. Comey was a registered Republican for most of his adult life; however, in 2016, he described himself as unaffiliated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Gregory (journalist)</span> American television journalist and presenter

David Michael Gregory is an American television personality and the former host of NBC News' Sunday morning talk show Meet the Press. Gregory has served as a CNN political analyst since 2016.

During her tenure as United States Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton drew controversy by using a private email server for official public communications rather than using official State Department email accounts maintained on federal servers. After a years-long FBI investigation, it was determined that Clinton's server did not contain any information or emails that were clearly marked classified. Federal agencies did, however, retrospectively determine that 100 emails contained information that should have been deemed classified at the time they were sent, including 65 emails deemed "Secret" and 22 deemed "Top Secret". An additional 2,093 emails were retroactively designated confidential by the State Department.

Tara Palmeri is an American journalist. She is currently the Senior Political Correspondent for subscription news platform Puck. Previously, she served as Chief National Correspondent at Politico and host and chief investigative reporter of two Sony Music podcasts: "Broken: Seeking Justice" and "Power: The Maxwells". She previously worked for Washington Examiner and the New York Post and was a White House correspondent for ABC News.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carter Page</span> American oil industry consultant

Carter William Page is an American petroleum industry consultant and a former foreign-policy adviser to Donald Trump during his 2016 presidential election campaign. Page is the founder and managing partner of Global Energy Capital, a one-man investment fund and consulting firm specializing in the Russian and Central Asian oil and gas business.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections</span>

The Russian government used espionage to interfere in the 2016 United States elections with the goals of sabotaging the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, boosting the presidential campaign of Donald Trump, and increasing political and social discord in the United States. According to the U.S. intelligence community, the operation—code named Project Lakhta —was ordered directly by Russian president Vladimir Putin. The 448-page Mueller report, made public in April 2019, examined over 200 contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian officials but concluded that there was insufficient evidence to bring any conspiracy or coordination charges against Trump or his associates.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steele dossier</span> Political opposition research report regarding the 2016 US election

The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier, is a controversial political opposition research report compiled by Christopher Steele that was published without permission as an unfinished 35-page compilation of unverified raw intelligence reports—"not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation". It was written from June to December 2016 and contains allegations of misconduct, conspiracy, and cooperation between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and the government of Russia prior to and during the 2016 election campaign. Several key allegations made in June 2016 were later corroborated by the January 2017 report by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, namely that Vladimir Putin favored Trump over Hillary Clinton; that he personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's campaign and to "undermine public faith in the US democratic process"; that he ordered cyberattacks on both parties; and that many Trump campaign officials and associates had numerous secretive contacts with Russian officials and agents. While Steele's documents played a significant role in initially highlighting the general friendliness between Trump and the Putin administration, the veracity of specific allegations is highly variable. Some have been publicly confirmed, others are plausible but not specifically confirmed, and some are dubious in retrospect but not strictly disproven.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dismissal of James Comey</span> Politically-charged firing

James Comey, the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), was fired by U.S. President Donald Trump on May 9, 2017. Comey had been criticized in 2016 for his handling of the FBI's investigation of the Hillary Clinton email controversy and in 2017 for the FBI's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections as it related to alleged collusion with Trump's presidential campaign.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Links between Trump associates and Russian officials</span>

Since Donald Trump was a 2016 candidate for the office of President of the United States, myriad suspicious links between Trump associates and Russian officials have been discovered by the FBI, Special counsel, and several United States congressional committees, as part of their investigations into the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Following intelligence reports about the Russian interference, Trump and some of his campaign members, business partners, administration nominees, and family members were subjected to intense scrutiny to determine whether they had improper dealings during their contacts with Russian officials. Several people connected to the Trump campaign made false statements about those links and obstructed investigations. These investigations resulted in many criminal charges and indictments.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timeline of investigations into Donald Trump and Russia (January–June 2017)</span>

This is a timeline of major events in the first half of 2017 related to the investigations into links between associates of Donald Trump and Russian officials and spies that are suspected of being inappropriate, relating to Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Following the timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections before and after July 2016 up until election day November 8 and the post-election transition, this article begins with Donald Trump and Mike Pence being sworn into office on January 20, 2017, and is followed by the second half of 2017. The investigations continued in the first and second halves of 2018, the first and second halves of 2019, 2020, and 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timeline of investigations into Donald Trump and Russia (January–June 2018)</span>

This is a timeline of major events in first half of 2018 related to the investigations into links between associates of Donald Trump and Russian officials and spies that are suspected of being inappropriate, relating to Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. It follows the timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections before and after July 2016 up until election day November 8, the transition, and the first and second halves of 2017, but precedes the second half of 2018, the first and second halves of 2019, 2020, and 2021. These events are related to, but distinct from, Russian interference in the 2018 United States elections.

Henry Kyle (Keenan) Frese is a former employee at the Defense Intelligence Agency, between February 2018 and October 2019, during which time he was assigned to a facility in Virginia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Russia investigation origins counter-narrative</span> Conspiracy theory concerning the 2016 US elections

U.S. government investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 elections, and the links between Russian intelligence and Trump associates, started with the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane investigation, and continued with the "Mueller investigation" which was established after President Donald Trump fired the director of the FBI James Comey,. The Mueller investigation concluded that Russian interference was "sweeping and systematic" and "violated U.S. criminal law", and indicted Russian citizens and Russian organizations. The investigation "identified numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign". The investigation resulted in charges against 34 individuals and 3 companies, 8 guilty pleas, and a conviction at trial. However it concluded that though the Trump campaign welcomed the Russian activities and expected to benefit from them, there was insufficient evidence to bring any conspiracy or coordination charges against Trump or his associates, and that they were prevented from reaching a conclusion on whether Trump had obstructed justice by a Justice Department guideline prohibiting the federal indictment of a sitting president.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timeline of investigations into Donald Trump and Russia (July–December 2018)</span>

This is a timeline of major events in second half of 2018 related to the investigations into the many suspicious links between Trump associates and Russian officials and spies relating to the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. It follows the timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections before and after July 2016 up until election day November 8, and the transition, the first and second halves of 2017, and the first half of 2018, but precedes that of the first and second halves of 2019, 2020, and 2021. These events are related to, but distinct from, Russian interference in the 2018 United States elections.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timeline of investigations into Donald Trump and Russia (July–December 2017)</span>

This is a timeline of major events in the second half of 2017 related to the investigations into the many suspicious links between Trump associates and Russian officials and spies relating to the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. It follows the timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections before and after July 2016 up until election day November 8, the post-election transition, and the first half of 2017. The investigations continued in the first and second halves of 2018, the first and second halves of 2019, 2020, and 2021.

James A. Wolfe is a former Security Director of the U.S. Senate Select Intelligence Committee (SSCI), having served in that position for 29 years. In 2018, he was sentenced to two months in federal prison after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI in relation to an investigation into leaks.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2017–2018 Department of Justice metadata seizures</span> Seizure of two American congressmens personal data

The United States Department of Justice under the Trump administration acquired by a February 2018 subpoena the Apple iCloud metadata of two Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, several others associated with the committee, and some of their family members. The subpoena covered 73 phone numbers and 36 email addresses since the inception of the accounts. Seizing communications information of members of Congress is extraordinarily rare. The department also subpoenaed and obtained 2017 and 2018 phone log and email metadata from news reporters for CNN, The Washington Post and The New York Times. Apple also received and complied with February 2018 subpoenas for the iCloud accounts of White House counsel Don McGahn and his wife. Microsoft received a subpoena relating to a personal email account of a congressional staff member in 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Targeting Center</span>

The National Targeting Center (NTC) is a division of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). It is based in Sterling, Virginia. The NTC observes air traffic and trade activities, gathers and vets intelligence, and is empowered to send e-mails requesting that U.S. citizens be detained and questioned.

References

  1. ↑ @playbookplus (October 27, 2017). "HAPPY BIRTHDAY to @mlcalderone, @AliWatkins and Chris @vlasto!" (Tweet). Archived from the original on August 27, 2020 – via Twitter.
  2. ↑ JAKE SHERMAN; ANNA PALMER; DANIEL LIPPMAN (October 27, 2018). "POLITICO Playbook: Trump: 'I could really tone it up,' but chooses not to". The Politico . Retrieved March 28, 2022. BIRTHDAYS: [...] NYT's Ali Watkins
  3. ↑ Sarah Ellison; Paul Farhi (June 8, 2018). "Leak investigation that led to Senate aide's indictment puts spotlight on New York Times reporter". Chicago Tribune . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  4. ↑ Neuman, Scott (June 7, 2018). "Former Senate Aide Charged With Lying To FBI About Contacts With Reporters". NPR . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  5. 1 2 "Finalist: Marisa Taylor, Jonathan Landay and Ali Watkins of McClatchy Newspapers". The Pulitzer Prizes. The Pulitzer Prizes – Columbia University. Retrieved June 10, 2018. For timely coverage of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report on CIA torture, demonstrating initiative and perseverance in overcoming government efforts to hide the details.
  6. ↑ "Ali Watkins Joining Washington Bureau". December 5, 2017. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  7. ↑ Lauter, David; Fawcett, Eliza (June 8, 2018). "Indicted former Senate staffer appears in court as Russia leak inquiry sets off partisan fireworks". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  8. ↑ Nicole Hensley; Janon Fisher (June 7, 2018). "Ex-Senate Intelligence Committee staffer indicted for lying about talks with reporters in leaks probe". Daily News . New York. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  9. ↑ Jeff Cronin; Kim Fischer (May 8, 2014). "Ali Watkins: From Owl to watchdog". Temple Now. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  10. ↑ Michael Boren (June 8, 2018). "Temple grad Ali Watkins, a New York Times reporter, at center of debate over press freedom and government leaks". The Philadelphia Inquirer . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  11. ↑ Greta Anderson (June 8, 2018). "Temple alumnus and former Temple News editor's records seized amid classified leak case". The Temple News . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  12. ↑ "Temple senior breaks national story involving CIA". March 11, 2014. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  13. ↑ "Temple senior breaks national story involving CIA".
  14. ↑ Nausicaa Renner (November 10, 2019). ""IF IT'S GONNA COME OUT, IT'S GONNA COME OUT THE RIGHT WAY": HEROES OF TORTURE REPORT MOVIE ARE LAUDED FOR DODGING REPORTERS". The Intercept . Retrieved December 8, 2019. The movie, here, elides the fact that reporter who actually broke this story was Ali Watkins — then a reporter at McClatchy
  15. ↑ Toby Harnden (June 17, 2018). "Eager reporter Ali Watkins and lover James Wolfe tumble from real House of Cards". The Times .
  16. ↑ Ellison, Sarah; Farhi, Paul (June 8, 2018). "Young reporter in leak investigation enjoyed meteoric rise in Washington journalism". The Washington Post . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  17. ↑ Brian Flood (June 13, 2018). "Did 'hotshot' NY Times reporter Ali Watkins simply benefit from top-secret pillow talk?". Fox News Channel . Retrieved June 16, 2018.
  18. 1 2 Grynbaum, Michael M.; Shane, Scott; Flitter, Emily (June 24, 2018). "How an Affair Between a Reporter and a Security Aide Has Rattled Washington Media". The New York Times. Retrieved April 23, 2019. Ms. Watkins scored a scoop that other news organizations scrambled to match
  19. ↑ Wemple, Erik (June 27, 2018). "Five questions about the Ali Watkins-James Wolfe story". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 27, 2018. Retrieved December 29, 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  20. ↑ Elahe Izadi; Paul Farhi (December 18, 2020). "The New York Times could not verify ISIS claims in its 'Caliphate' podcast. Now it's returning a prestigious award". The Washington Post. Retrieved January 8, 2021. Ali Watkins, who covered national security for the Times, was given a new assignment in 2018 after she disclosed that she had had a romantic relationship with a Senate Intelligence Committee staffer with access to sensitive intelligence data.
  21. ↑ Paul Farhi (July 3, 2018). "New York Times reassigns reporter who dated Senate intelligence staffer at center of FBI probe". The Washington Post. Retrieved July 5, 2018.
  22. ↑ Jon Levine (July 3, 2018). "New York Times Reassigns Reporter Who Had Sexual Relationship With Source". San Francisco Chronicle . Archived from the original on July 4, 2018. Retrieved July 5, 2018.
  23. ↑ Tau, Byron (December 20, 2018). "Ex-Senate Staffer Accused of Lying to FBI Gets Jail Time". The Wall Street Journal . Archived from the original on June 4, 2020. Retrieved June 4, 2020. Ali Watkins, the New York Times reporter ensnared in the case, was reassigned from her job as a national security reporter in Washington, D.C., to a new position in New York City after it was revealed in the indictment that she'd had a yearslong relationship with Mr. Wolfe [...] the relationship still constituted a breach of ethics, the paper's top editor concluded.
  24. ↑ Lukas I. Alpert (July 3, 2018). "New York Times Reassigns Reporter Whose Records Were Seized by the U.S." The Wall Street Journal . Retrieved June 4, 2020. Watkins would be reassigned to a position in New York "for a fresh start," and that "she will be closely supervised and have a senior mentor."
  25. ↑ "Ali Watkins". The New York Times. Archived from the original on February 28, 2020. Retrieved March 5, 2020. Ali Watkins is a reporter on Metro desk at The New York Times, where she covers crime and law enforcement in New York City.
  26. ↑ "New York Times reassigns reporter Ali Watkins, reporter in leak investigation".
  27. ↑ Brian Flood (July 3, 2018). "New York Times gives star D.C. reporter Ali Watkins a 'fresh start' in new bureau after claims she dated sources". Fox News Channel. Retrieved July 5, 2018. The Times announced on Tuesday that Watkins will relocate to New York after an internal review of her romantic history with potential sources
  28. ↑ "Ex-Senate aide James Wolfe turns himself in over 'FBI leaks'". BBC.
  29. ↑ Erik Wemple (October 10, 2019). "Reporters at CNBC and NBC News become tangled in leak investigation". The Washington Post. Retrieved November 2, 2019. Wolfe carried on a romantic relationship with Watkins while she covered the committee for several publications
  30. ↑ JOSH GERSTEIN; MATTHEW CHOI (December 20, 2018). "Ex-Senate aide gets 2 months in prison for lying to FBI". Politico . Retrieved June 19, 2020. after being confronted with photographs of himself and Watkins, he acknowledged having a personal relationship with her for several years
  31. ↑ Kelly Cohen (December 21, 2018). "Former Senate Intel aide accused of passing info to 'young, female reporters' gets 2 months". Washington Examiner . Retrieved December 22, 2018. court documents show he briefed Watkins and other reporters about the subpoena.
  32. 1 2 Savage, Charlie (October 15, 2018). "Ex-Senate Aide Pleads Guilty to Lying to F.B.I. About Contacts With Reporter". The New York Times . Retrieved October 19, 2018.
  33. ↑ "READ: DOJ Inspector General's Report on the Russia Investigation".
  34. ↑ Johnson, Carrie (October 15, 2018). "Ex-Senate Intelligence Staffer Who Dated Reporter Pleads Guilty To Lying To FBI". NPR . Retrieved October 15, 2018.
  35. ↑ Christal Hayes (December 20, 2018). "James Wolfe, ex-intelligence aide who dated reporter, sentenced to 2 months in leak probe". USA Today. Retrieved February 26, 2019.
  36. ↑ Garrett Haake; Charlie Gile; Tracy Connor (June 8, 2018). "Ex-Senate aide James Wolfe, accused of lying, goes before judge". NBC News. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  37. ↑ Adam Goldman; Nicholas Fandos; Katie Benner (June 7, 2018). "Ex-Senate Aide Charged in Leak Case Where Times Reporter's Records Were Seized". The New York Times. Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  38. ↑ Pappas, Alex (June 10, 2018). "Ali Watkins' past tweets come back to haunt NYT reporter amid leak case". Fox News Channel . Retrieved June 15, 2018.
  39. ↑ Erik Wemple (June 14, 2018). "Ali Watkins's substantial conflict of interest". The Washington Post. Retrieved June 15, 2018.
  40. ↑ Sarah Ellison; Paul Farhi (June 8, 2018). "Young reporter in leak investigation enjoyed meteoric rise in Washington journalism". Connecticut Post . Retrieved June 10, 2018.
  41. ↑ Michael M. Grynbaum; Scott Shane; Emily Flitter (June 24, 2018). "How an Affair Between a Reporter and a Security Aide Has Rattled Washington Media". The New York Times. Retrieved June 25, 2018. In the fall, Ms. Watkins started dating a different staff member from the committee. She told others that she had informed a Politico editor who did not object. But Mr. Dayspring, the Politico spokesman, said: "Politico editors were not made aware of this relationship."
  42. ↑ JOE POMPEO (June 28, 2018). ""EVERY BONE IN MY BODY WANTS TO DEFEND ALI WATKINS": SEX, PRESS FREEDOM, AND THE COMPLICATED CASE OF A TIMES REPORTER". Vanity Fair . Retrieved March 5, 2020. As a woman journalist who spent her career trying to puncture the notion that all of us sleep with our sources and that's how we get stories," former Times executive editor Jill Abramson told me, "I hate the whole situation more than I can say."
  43. ↑ "A young reporter, her middle-aged source and the real-life House of Cards drama". The Sydney Morning Herald . June 18, 2018. Archived from the original on March 6, 2020. Retrieved March 6, 2020. The case bears a strong resemblance to the television drama House of Cards, of which Watkins confessed to be a fan in 2013. "I wanted to be Zoe Barnes ... until episode 4. Sleeping with your source ... #badlifechoice @HouseofCards."
  44. ↑ Erik Wemple (October 10, 2019). "Reporters at CNBC and NBC News become tangled in leak investigation". The Washington Post . Retrieved February 24, 2020. differentiates this investigation from [...] the 2018 case involving New York Times reporter Ali Watkins
  45. ↑ Stephen L. Miller (December 11, 2019). "Why is everyone pretending reporters never sleep with sources?". The Spectator . Retrieved February 24, 2020. Watkins and Macias are still employed by the Times and CNBC. Not only does it appear the practice of sleeping with sources for information is more than a mere trope, it seems it's something not punished by newsrooms
  46. ↑ J.D. TUCCILLE (December 15, 2021). "Attract Government Attention and Get Your Name Run Through a 'Terrorist' Database". Reason . Retrieved December 17, 2021. email addresses, phone numbers and photos from passport applications and checking that information through numerous sensitive government databases, including the terrorism watchlist
  47. ↑ Jon Allsop (May 10, 2021). "The Trump administration spied on journalists. The Biden administration defended it". Columbia Journalism Review . Retrieved March 22, 2022. a Customs and Border Protection official reportedly confronted Watkins in person about her relationship with Wolfe and asked for her help in exposing leakers—an approach that Watkins perceived as a threat
  48. ↑ Jana Winter (December 11, 2021). "Operation Whistle Pig: Inside the secret CBP unit with no rules that investigates Americans". Yahoo! News . Retrieved December 17, 2021.
  49. ↑ Winter, Jana (December 31, 2021). "CBP launches review of secretive division that targeted journalists, lawmakers and other Americans". Yahoo News . Retrieved January 3, 2022. CBP's internal probe was prompted by Yahoo News' reporting earlier this month on Operation Whistle Pig, a leak investigation targeting reporter Ali Watkins
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.