Major networks band together to drop joint video coverage of Trump after he banned CNN
MAJOR television networks banded together to halt their shared coverage of President Donald Trump after he barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House, a move that triggered a lawsuit.
“Effective today, the TV pool will not be covering events designated as pool coverage of the President,” Bryan Boughton, Fox News’ Washington bureau chief, wrote in a message to television pool members Monday, according to The New York Times.
For years, Fox News, ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC have rotated responsibility for televising presidential events under an agreement to share footage and split costs.
“This follows the White House’s position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties,” Boughton wrote. “There will be no replacement pool put in place. All other pool coverage will continue as normal.”
He added that further updates are expected “as this situation develops.”
The White House television pool members also posted a joint statement on Monday via NBC News’ communications department.
"The public has a vital interest in receiving accurate, independent information about its government,” the statement read. “No administration should restrict a news organisation because it objects to its reporting.”
The halt in pool coverage came shortly after the three news organizations banned from the White House by Trump announced they are suing the government.
The three outlets, CNN,MS NOW and POLITICO, are filing the federal lawsuit to restore access to the White House for their reporters, after their clearance was revoked Saturday.
Trump and three major White House officials - Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Communications Director Steven Cheung and Secret Service Director Sean Curran - are all named in the lawsuit.
“This morning, we notified the government that we are filing a lawsuit today to protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes,” a joint statement from news outlets said on Monday.
“Without notice or process, the White House revoked our journalists’ credentials because it objected to our reporting,” the statement continued. “Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”
Trump confirmed on Friday that the three organisations were being banned from the White House. On Truth Social, he declared that the ban was “effective immediately.”
“Media Outlets shouldn’t be able to constantly write or report FICTION and LIES when they’re covering the President of the United States, the Trump Administration, or the United States of America,” he claimed. “Other Fake News Media Outlets to follow.”
By Saturday morning, CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO all said that their journalists had been stopped from accessing the White House grounds. Speaking live on Saturday, MS NOW’s White House Correspondent Akayla Gardner confirmed that she had been unable to enter the building.
“The officer asked me to hand over my badge. He said that it was disabled,” Gardner said. “I asked why I was not able to get inside. He said it was above him.”
Betsy Klein, senior White House reporter at CNN, said live that same morning that her badge had been taken. She says that she has been covering events at the White House, in some capacity, since the Obama administration.
“I asked him if he could explain as to why it had been deactivated. He said he had no further information,” Klein said.
In an email shared to the POLITICO newsroom, Global Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Greenberger confirmed that reporter Cheyenne Haslett also had her pass taken away by the Secret Service.
“We stand by her and all reporters here covering the White House,” Greenberger said in the email, shared by Haslett on X. “As we said yesterday, we will vigorously defend our First Amendment rights.”
Now, the three organizations are being represented by an attorney at the law firm Gibson Dunn.
The lawsuit, viewed by The Independent, argues that the ban violates the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, as well as the First Amendment, and calls for the press passes to be restored.
“This ban could not be a more direct assault on the First Amendment nor a more blatant violation of our most fundamental constitutional principles,” the lawsuit reads.
“Presidents from the earliest days of the Republic have disagreed with and complained about the tenor and content of press coverage of their administrations.
“But as the Supreme Court has recognised, the First Amendment, including its guarantee of a free press, reflects “a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.
“No official can deprive Plaintiffs of those interests on a whim—with no notice, no process, and no warning—as the President did here.”
Posting on Truth Social on Monday, Trump denied suggestions that the White House was infringing on press freedoms.
“The White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish,” he wrote. “It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like cancer in our beloved United States of America.”
Trump continued, “It is corrupt, purposeful, pervasive, fully coordinated, and totally out of control. It is a threat to our national security and must be stopped, NOW!”
On Monday, Vice President JD Vance denied that the three outlets had been banned.
"He's not banning media outlets,” Vance told reporters. “What he's doing is saying we're not going to give you special access to the White House if you engage in what is effectively propaganda."
