On July 11, 2026, New York Times White House correspondent Maggie Haberman appeared on MS NOW's “The Weekend,” where host Jonathan Capehart asked about Trump's mental acuity. She said his health had become “like a black box inside that administration,” pointing to his repeated Walter Reed visits, about which officials have released “less and less information.”
Hours later, Trump went after her on Truth Social. He used a pejorative nickname, wrote that she had “covered me incorrectly for ten years,” and issued a threat tied to his own litigation: “She has made a living off her bad reporting, and will pay the price when our Multi Billion Dollar Lawsuit against The Failing New York Times gets to Court, which should not be that long.” He also said he had recently had a physical at Walter Reed and had requested a cognitive exam.
Naming an individual reporter and warning she will “pay the price” through a pending lawsuit turns a defamation suit into a threat against coverage the president dislikes. It came the same week Trump snapped “Don't talk about it” at CNN when asked about the Strait of Hormuz, and days after four other Times journalists were subpoenaed over the paper's Air Force One reporting (see The White House Had Patel Run a Leak Investigation Into the Times's Air Force One Reporting, Then Four Reporters Were Subpoenaed and A Judge Throws Out Trump Media's $3.8 Billion Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post).