The Supreme Court declined to save journalist Catherine Herridge from having to reveal her source or pay fines in a case that she said raises a crucial First Amendment issue.

Herridge had asked the justices to stop a lower court ruling from taking effect that would put her to that choice.

In an order on Thursday, the high court declined Herridge’s request. As is typical for such actions, the court did not explain its reasoning. The order noted that Justice Brett Kavanaugh would have granted Herridge’s request.

She was held in contempt by a Washington, D.C., judge in a case brought against the federal government by Yanping Chen, who alleged that officials violated the Privacy Act by disclosing records about her that were collected as part of an FBI investigation. The records were published by Fox News, where Herridge worked at the time.

To help in her lawsuit against the government, Chen sought to make Herridge identify who leaked the records. Herridge invoked the reporter’s privilege under the First Amendment, but the district judge said Chen overcame the privilege and ordered Herridge to answer Chen’s questions. Herridge declined, and the court held her in contempt and set a fine of $800 a day. The federal appeals court in Washington upheld the judge’s ruling.

Herridge urged the appeals court to halt its ruling from taking effect while she petitions the Supreme Court on what she called the exceptionally important question of the scope of the reporter’s privilege to protect confidential sources. Without such relief in the meantime, her lawyers argued to the appeals court, she’d have to “reveal her confidential source(s) or pay a draconian sanction of $800 per day, in violation of her First Amendment rights.”

Opposing that relief in the appeals court, Chen said that Herridge “has no special solicitude to flout a court order” and that she “retains the ability to pay the monetary sanctions imposed by the district court instead of complying with the order.” Chen said in the “unlikely event” that the Supreme Court is interested in reviewing Herridge’s underlying appeal, the journalist would be able to recoup any monetary fines she pays.

The appeals court denied Herridge’s request on June 23, and she filed a sealed application to the Supreme Court on June 26. That same day, Chief Justice John Roberts issued an order temporarily halting the lower court ruling against Herridge from taking effect while the full court considers whether to provide Herridge longer-term relief. (Roberts is the justice assigned to field emergency motions from Washington.)

Opposing Herridge’s application at the high court, Chen said the reporter’s interest in protecting her source(s) is outweighed by Chen’s right under the Privacy Act to learn the identity of the federal official(s) whom she said violated her rights. Chen said the justices are unlikely to grant review of Herridge’s underlying appeal, noting the high court has refused to review multiple previous appeals raising the same issue. It takes four justices to grant review of a petition.

Herridge’s application that the court rejected on Thursday is a separate filing from her forthcoming petition, which will challenge the lower court ruling itself. The justices will consider the latter filing separately after it is lodged with the court.

Supporting Herridge in an amicus brief, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said the justices should halt the lower court ruling from taking effect while she petitions the high court, in order to avoid what the group called an “unjust result” that “would chill the work of journalists well beyond the facts of this proceeding.”

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