Ex-Senate Intel staffer pleads guilty to lying to feds over contacts with journalists

Judge Ketanji B. Jackson in court asked Wolfe, “Did you make a false statement to the FBI?” 

“I did, your honor,” Wolfe replied, according to CNN.

{mosads}Wolfe was arrested in June for lying about his communication with three reporters, including The New York Times’s Ali Watkins, with whom he allegedly had a years-long romantic relationship.

The government seized Watkins’s phone and email records while investigating Wolfe, setting off a controversy about whether the federal government can subpoena journalists in order to identify their sources.

Wolfe served as director of security for the Senate Intelligence Committee, which gave him access to classified documents. The Department of Justice has accused him of leaking confidential information to reporters.

He pleaded not guilty to the federal charges of lying to the FBI in June. 

President Trump over the summer openly supported Wolfe’s arrest, saying, “I’m a very big believer in freedom of the press, but I’m also a believer that you cannot leak classified information.”

Wolfe oversaw some of the committee’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, according to NBC News. 

Wolfe’s attorneys in June said they would “vigorously defend Wolfe against this unfair and unjustified prosecution” and seek a gag order to bar government officials, including the president, from making “prejudicial statements” about the case. 

Free speech advocates urgently criticized the Justice Department’s seizure of Watkins’s documents, accusing the Trump administration of unfairly targeting journalists. 

Attorney General Jeff Sessions at the time said it was part of the department’s crackdown on leakers. 

-Updated 3:40 p.m.