‘DEEPLY CHILLING’

Judge Holds Ex-Fox News Reporter in Contempt for Refusing to Reveal Sources

Herridge will be fined $800 per day until she reveals her confidential sources in a case that has alarmed journalists and First Amendment watchdogs.

A federal judge held former CBS News and Fox News reporter Catherine Herridge in civil contempt on Thursday for refusing to reveal her sources for a series of stories about a Chinese-American scientist who was being investigated by the FBI. The articles in question, written when Herridge was a Fox News correspondent, revealed that Dr. Yanping Chen was being probed by the FBI over suspected ties to the Chinese military. The scientist was never charged and in 2018 she sued the FBI and DOJ for violating the Privacy Act, which protects private information collected by a government agency. The U.S. District Court judge ordered Herridge to reveal her confidential sources last year, and because she has yet to do so, the court held her in civil contempt, ordering her to pay $800 per day in fines. Both CBS News, which laid off Herridge earlier this month, and Fox News issued separate statements condemning the ruling and its “deeply chilling” effects on the First Amendment and journalism. Chen’s lawyer, meanwhile, maintained in a statement that the government must not be allowed to “selectively leak documents to smear reputations or score political points.”