The Liberty Daily 
(The Epoch Times)—Supreme Court justices on July 2 denied a request from former Fox News reporter Catherine Herridge to stay lower court rulings in a case involving at least one secret source.
Eight justices declined to enter a stay against a ruling that ordered Herridge to disclose her sources, and to pay $800 for each day she does not.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh said he would have stayed the ruling.
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Lawyers for Herridge and Yanping Chen, a Chinese scientist and naturalized American citizen with alleged ties to the Chinese military, did not return requests for comment by time of publication.
The development came in a case involving a series of stories that Herridge wrote while working for Fox News centered on Chen in which she cited confidential sources in reporting that the FBI investigated Chen and her alleged ties to China.
Chen sued in 2018 over an alleged violation of her privacy.
A federal judge in 2023 ordered Herridge to disclose her sources. The judge later found Herridge in contempt and said she would be fined $800 for each day that elapsed without her complying, although he paused the fine as an appeal was pending.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the judge’s decision, concluding in 2025 that Herridge was not entitled to withhold the sources’ identities.
That set up the appeal to the Supreme Court, which was filed under seal.
Herridge has argued in court papers that the U.S. Constitution provided her with reporter’s privilege and that she should not have to disclose the identities of her sources. She said that the federal judge wrongly applied a 1981 decision that involved reporter’s privilege.
Chen has said in filings, including one to the Supreme Court, that Herridge should stop delaying the disclosure of her source or sources.
“Although Herridge has repeatedly failed to convince the courts that her position is meritorious, she has reaped the benefits of a stay that the district court entered over two-and-a-half years ago,” lawyers for Chen told the nation’s top court. “Allowing her to continue obfuscating would render the Privacy Act toothless, as litigants like Herridge could obtain an endless and unwarranted series of stays to blunt the weighty ‘private right of action’ codified in the Privacy Act. Herridge’s application for a stay should be denied.”
Press organizations, including the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, have voiced support for Herridge and her position.
