The White House announces it “will determine” which news outlets will have access to cover President Trump
By Olivia Peters
On Tuesday, the White House announced that its officials “will determine” which news organizations can have access to cover President Donald Trump.
This is a major change from a century of tradition in which a group of independently chosen news outlets are given access to follow the President and hold him accountable on behalf of the American public.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt described the change as a modernization of the press pool, saying the shift will restore “access back to the American people.”
Media experts are worried the move could result in First Amendment violations as Trump will have the power to choose who covers him and who does not.
Leavitt further commented on the change, saying, “The White House press team, in this administration, will determine who gets to enjoy the very privileged and limited access in spaces such as Air Force One and the Oval Office.” She added, “A select group of D.C. based journalists should no longer have a monopoly of press access at the White House.”
The President has already faced backlash surrounding the federal lawsuit filed by The Associated Press.
Several days ago, White House officials began restricting the AP’s access to presidential events as a result of the news outlet’s refusal to call the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” as ordered by Trump.
In response, the AP filed a lawsuit against 3 Trump administration officials, one being Karoline Leavitt.
The case was assigned to U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, who said the AP had not demonstrated it had suffered irreparable harm but encouraged the Trump administration to reconsider its two-week-old ban. This decision was only momentary, as McFadden told attorneys for the Trump administration and the AP that the issue needed more exploration before a ruling could be reached. Another hearing is scheduled for late March.
At an event in the Oval Office, the president connected the AP lawsuit with the new decision to take control of the press pool.
Jon Marshall, a media history professor at Northwestern University, commented on the change saying, ”It means the president can pick and choose who covers the executive branch, ignoring the fact that it is the American people who through their taxes pay for the running of the White House, the president’s travels and the press secretary’s salary.”
President of the White House Correspondents’ Association, Eugene Daniels, similarly criticized the change, saying, “This move tears at the independence of a free press in the United States. It suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president. In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps.”