New York Times denounces Trump's 'intimidation tactics' against
reporters
[March 25, 2025]
By DAVID BAUDER
The New York Times on Monday denounced “intimidation tactics” by
President Donald Trump against its reporters after days in which the
administration assailed the newspaper's reporting on Elon Musk and the
Defense Department.
The newspaper said in a post on X — the platform owned by Musk — that
Trump's approach has “never caused us to back down from our mission of
holding powerful people to account, regardless of which party is in
office.” Peter Baker, Maggie Haberman and their colleagues “have an
unrivaled record of covering this and prior administrations fully and
fairly,” the Times said.
It was responding to Trump's Sunday night Truth Social post that
specifically criticized the Times' Haberman, whose name was misspelled
by the president as “Hagerman,” and Baker, along with Baker's wife, New
Yorker writer Susan Glasser.
“There's something really wrong with these people, and their SICK,
DERANGED EDITORS,” Trump wrote. “They did everything in their power to
help rig the Election against me. How did that work out???”
Trump has been known to publicly attack news organizations or specific
journalists; not all of them choose to respond and engage.
Explaining its decision to defend its reporters, the Times said people
shouldn't lose sight of Trump and his administration's real goal as they
intensify their efforts to crack down on the free press, spokesman
Charles Stadtlander said.
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Traffic passes The New York Times building in New York, Oct. 20,
2011. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)
“The administration wants to make it more difficult for reporters to
bring to light important information that the president would rather
stay secret," he said. “And they want to undermine public confidence in
journalists who ask difficult questions and publish uncomfortable
truths.”
In criticizing Baker, Trump said he has written "many of the long and
boring Fake News hit pieces against me.”
Haberman was among five bylines on a story released late Thursday that
said the billionaire Musk was to receive a briefing on the military's
top-secret plans if a war broke out with China. The newspaper said it
would represent a potential conflict of interest for Musk, who is
helping the administration in government cost-cutting moves and has
financial interests in China.
The Defense Department furiously denounced the story, calling the Times
“a propaganda machine that should immediately retract their lies.”
The newspaper stood by its story and later reported that the meeting was
called off after the Times reported it was about to happen. While Trump
also said it was a “fake story,” he made clear that Musk should not be
given access to the information.
Haberman is the author of the 2022 book “Confidence Man: The Making of
Donald Trump and the Breaking of America.”
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