Former President Donald Trump on Thursday reacted angrily to news that the United States Supreme Court could not identify the individual who leaked a draft copy of its decision to overturn Roe v. Wade -- and he said the journalists who reported the story should be thrown in jail.
"The Supreme Court has just announced it is not able to find out, even with the help of our “crack” FBI, who the leaker was on the R v Wade scandal," the former president wrote on his Truth Social platform. "They’ll never find out, & it’s important that they do. So, go to the reporter & ask him/her who it was. If not given the answer, put whoever in jail until the answer is given. You might add the publisher and editor to the list. Stop playing games, this leaking cannot be allowed to happen. It won’t take long before the name of this slime is revealed!"
To further emphasize his point, the former president wrote a followup post where he said, "Arrest the reporter, publisher, editor - you’ll get your answer fast. Stop playing games and wasting time!"
Despite Trump's desires, it is unclear whether the government could jail the Politico reporters who broke the story on the court's landmark reversal of abortion rights in the United States.
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Many journalists are protected from prosecution by state shield laws that allow them to maintain the confidentiality of their sources.
Although there have been rare exceptions to this, most of the attempted prosecutions for reporters who have refused to reveal their sources have come in the realm of national security, not a leaked draft of a Supreme Court opinion that was published publicly weeks after the leak.
