The New York Times has publicly condemned what it described as "intimidation tactics" employed by President Donald Trump against its reporters.
The statement came in response to a series of attacks from the Trump administration, particularly following the newspaper's coverage of Elon Musk and the Defense Department. The Times issued its rebuke via a post on X, the social media platform owned by Musk, emphasizing that such tactics have "never caused us to back down from our mission of holding powerful people to account, regardless of which party is in office."
The controversy was sparked by a Trump post on Truth Social on Sunday night, where he specifically targeted Times reporters Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman (whose name he misspelled as "Hagerman"), as well as Baker’s wife, Susan Glasser, a writer for The New Yorker. Trump labeled Baker a "really bad writer" and accused him of producing "long and boring Fake News hit pieces," while calling Haberman the "least talented writer" at the Times. He also criticized the newspaper’s editors as "sick" and "Trump deranged," alleging they tried to "rig the Election" against him.
The newspaper’s response was partly triggered by a specific article published on March 20, 2025, co-authored by Haberman and others, which reported that Musk, a key Trump ally involved in government cost-cutting efforts, was slated to receive a Defense Department briefing on top-secret military plans for a potential war with China. The Times highlighted a possible conflict of interest due to Musk’s financial ties in China, prompting a fierce rebuttal from the Defense Department, which called the paper a "propaganda machine" and demanded a retraction.
This episode fits into a broader pattern of Trump’s second term, where he has consistently targeted media outlets and journalists, including legal actions against ABC News and CBS, and barring The Associated Press from events over unrelated disputes.
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