Editor questioned by officials at Virginia airport; phone seized and searched

Journalist Max Blumenthal was stopped, questioned and had his cellphones seized and searched by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents at Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia after returning from a reporting trip to Iran on July 10, 2026.

Blumenthal had traveled to Iran on a press visa to cover the funeral of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for The Grayzone, the online news outlet he edits and founded in 2015.

While there, he covered official press events alongside reporters from other U.S. news organizations. He also reported on the aftermath of the joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, and interviewed government officials and residents for a series of videos and articles.

Blumenthal told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the boarding pass for his connecting flight from Istanbul, Turkey, to Dulles was flagged for secondary screening before he arrived in the United States.

When he landed, CBP officers escorted him to a secondary inspection room, where he waited about 30 minutes before being questioned, according to a federal lawsuit filed later against Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.

Officers searched Blumenthal’s carry-on bags and asked whether he felt threatened while reporting in Iran, whether he had been compensated for interviews he conducted there, how he paid for his travel and whether he planned to return to Iran.

After about 10 minutes of questioning, officers accompanied Blumenthal to baggage claim, where they also searched his checked luggage, according to the federal complaint. They then told him they needed to examine his two cellphones to look for evidence of criminal activity or child sexual abuse material.

When Blumenthal declined to provide the passcodes, officers seized both his cellphones. One officer told him they were going to “hook them up to machines” to extract data from them, according to the lawsuit. Blumenthal was detained for about 2 1/2 hours before being released without his phones.

Blumenthal said he has never been accused of or convicted of a crime, and that officers had no basis to suspect him of criminal activity. He questioned why they seized only his phones, rather than his laptop or digital camera, if they were searching for such material.

Blumenthal told the Tracker that the stop came after conservative activist Laura Loomer, who has been an informal adviser to President Donald Trump, publicly urged the administration to arrest him.

He said the CBP officers’ questions mirrored Loomer’s accusations and that he believes he was targeted because he reports critically, and sometimes shares his opinion, on U.S. foreign policy and Israel.

“It’s pretty obvious that I’m being targeted for political reasons and for my reporting,” Blumenthal said. “The only political activity I engage in is reporting. I don’t do activism, I don’t organize protests, I’m not running for office.”

The search of Blumenthal’s cellphones could expose the identities of his confidential sources, communications with his contacts, unpublished reporting and the methods by which he conducts his journalism, the lawsuit alleged.

“Every journalist should be concerned and especially vigilant when the First and Fourth amendments are subjugated ruthlessly in order to repress those who are perceived as enemies for their reporting,” Blumenthal told the Tracker.

After he filed his lawsuit on July 16 seeking the return of his devices, Blumenthal posted on social platform X that he had received a phone call informing him that he could retrieve them.

“This does not make our case moot, however,” he wrote. “I demand the return of any information, data, or copies obtained from my phones, and will be exploring further action related to the violation of my First and Fourth amendment rights.”

Blumenthal was also stopped by CBP in 2025 after returning from a vacation in Nicaragua. DHS did not immediately return a request for comment.