MICHELE NORRIS, Host: And as NPR's Carrie Johnson reports, that sets up a big test of the First Amendment.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: Ed McMahon is a lawyer for Sterling. He says the whole episode is shrouded in secrecy.</s>ED MCMAHON: Well, it's the government's right to publish literally whatever they wanted a criminal case, but it doesn't free me to make any comment about it whatsoever.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: Until the government's court filing Monday night, no one had acknowledged that Risen was Author A, mentioned cryptically in the Sterling indictment.</s>ED MCMAHON: I find this filing quite interesting in that regard. But I can't say anything about it.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: Justice Department prosecutors say this time they really mean it. Laura Sweeney is a spokeswoman for the government.</s>LAURA SWEENEY: We make every reasonable effort to attempt to obtain information from alternative sources, before even considering a subpoena to a member of the press. And we only seek information essential to directly establishing innocence or guilt.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: To First Amendment lawyer Martin Garbus, the fact the government needs Risen so much exposes some problems with the Justice Department's case.</s>MARTIN GARBUS: There's a reason for the government to play that card showing how weak their case was, at any time prior to the trial, the government may hope that there'd be some kind of disposition, some kind of plea.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: Here's Miller talking to reporters in September 2005 on her way out of custody.</s>JUDITH MILLER: I served 85 days in jail because of my belief in the importance of upholding the confidential relationship journalists have with their sources.</s>CARRIE JOHNSON: Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.
The Justice Department has subpoenaed New York Times reporter Jim Risen to provide critical eyewitness testimony it says it can't get any other way in the leak case involving former CIA operative Jeffrey Sterling. Risen says he'll ask a judge to quash the subpoena, setting up a First Amendment fight and a game of chicken with high stakes.