The White House says it ‘will determine’ which news outlets cover Trump, rotating traditional ones

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The White House says it ‘will determine’ which news outlets cover Trump, rotating traditional ones​


By LAURIE KELLMAN

Updated 6:53 PM EST, February 25, 2025

The White House said Tuesday that its officials “will determine” which news outlets can regularly cover President Donald Trump up close — a sharp break from a century of tradition in which a pool of independently chosen news organizations go where the chief executive does and hold him accountable on behalf of regular Americans.

The move, coupled with the government’s arguments this week in a federal lawsuit over access filed by The Associated Press, represented an unprecedented seizing of control over coverage of the American presidency by any administration. Free speech advocates expressed alarm.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the changes would rotate traditional outlets from the group and include some streaming services. Leavitt cast the change as a modernization of the press pool, saying the move would be more inclusive and restore “access back to the American people” who elected Trump. But media experts said the move raised troubling First Amendment issues because the president is choosing who covers him.

“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,” Leavitt said at a daily briefing. She added at another point: “A select group of D.C.-based journalists should no longer have a monopoly of press access at the White House.”

Leavitt said the White House will “double down” on its decision to bar the AP from many presidential events, a departure from the time-tested and sometimes contentious practice for more than a century of a pool of journalists from every platform sharing the presidents’ words and activities with news outlets and congressional offices that can’t attend the close-quarter events. Traditionally, the members of the pool decide who goes in small spaces such as the Oval Office and Air Force One.

“It’s beyond time that the White House press operation reflects the media habits of the American people in 2025, not 1925,” Leavitt said.

At an event later in the Oval Office, the president linked the AP court case with the decision to take control of credentialing for the pool. “We’re going to be now calling those shots,” Trump said.



There are First Amendment implications​


The change, said one expert on presidents and the press, “is a dangerous move for democracy.”

”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,” Jon Marshall, a media history professor at Northwestern University and author of “Clash: Presidents and the Press in Times of Crisis,” said in a text.

Eugene Daniels, president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, said the organization consistently expands its membership and pool rotations to facilitate the inclusion of new and emerging outlets.

“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,” Daniels said in a statement. “In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps.”

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press called it “a drastic change in how the public obtains information about its government.”

“The White House press pool exists to serve the public, not the presidency,” Bruce D. Brown, the group’s president, said in a statement.



It comes in the context of a federal lawsuit​


Leavitt spoke a day after a federal judge refused to immediately order the White House to restore the AP’s access to many presidential events. The news outlet, citing the First Amendment, sued Leavitt and two other White House officials for barring the AP from some presidential events over its refusal to call the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” as Trump ordered. AP has said its style would retain the “Gulf of Mexico” name but also would note Trump’s decision.

“As you know, we won that lawsuit,” Trump said incorrectly. In fact, U.S. District Judge Trevor N. McFadden said the AP had not demonstrated it had suffered irreparable harm — but urged the Trump administration to reconsider its two-week-old ban, saying that case law in the circuit “is uniformly unhelpful to the White House.”

McFadden’s decision was only for the moment, however. He told attorneys for the Trump administration and the AP that the issue required more exploration before ruling. Another hearing was scheduled for late March.

The AP Stylebook is used by international audiences as well as those within the United States. The AP has said that its guidance was offered to promote clarity.

Another Trump executive order to change the name of the United States’ largest mountain back to Mount McKinley from Denali is being recognized by the AP Stylebook. Trump has the authority to do so because the mountain is completely within the country he oversees, AP has said.
 

bnew

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RIP freedom of the press.

Democracy died in Darkness (which is why the Washington Post no longer uses that slogan).

Nah Democracy died in full blown view when voters sold out their country for a red hat and a con-man who literally told them "I don't care about you, I just want your vote!" to their faces.


"Having served as a Moscow correspondent in the early days of Putin's reign, this reminds me of how the Kremlin took over its own press pool and made sure that only compliant journalists were given access. Every president of both parties going back generations subscribed to the principle that a president doesn't pick the press corps that is allowed in the room to ask him questions. Trump has just declared that he will." - White House takes control of the press pool, hopes to welcome ‘new voices’
"These developments should be recognized as a deliberate effort to align the U.S. media landscape with Trump's entrenched belief that independent journalism is 'truly the enemy of the people.'" - https://www.yahoo.com/news/white-house-asserts-control-over-213325237/
"The press and all citizens in the United States have the right to select their own words without government retaliation. The Constitution prohibits the government from controlling speech. Permitting such governmental control and retaliation poses a threat to the freedoms of every American." - The relationship between the White House and its press corps is time-tested — and can be contentious
"Preventing AP journalists from covering an Oval Office event because the AP has not adopted President Trump's name change is an infringement on the First Amendment." - White House says it has the right to punish AP reporters over Gulf naming dispute
"This is a dangerous move for democracy. 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." - This website is unavailable in your location. – WFTV
"When press access suffers, when press freedom suffers, the public suffers, maybe not right away, but down the line, we start to know less about the president, we start to know less about the administration, and ultimately everyone suffers." - White House says it will decide which news organizations routinely cover the president
"This is now the third day AP reporters have been barred from covering the president — first as a member of the pool, and now from a formal press conference — an incredible disservice to the billions of people who rely on the Associated Press for nonpartisan news." - White House bars Associated Press from spaces like Oval Office and Air Force One
"If we don't figure out a way to stand up to this, we're cooked." - https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/trump-white-house-press-pool-access-00206001
"RSF calls on Congress to take these assaults on press freedom seriously before they escalate further and hold the White House accountable for its retreat from public transparency." - USA: Trump's attacks on government transparency erode press freedom
"The attempted government censorship of a free press risks a chilling effect on journalists doing their job without fear or favor on behalf of the American people." - WHCA on "attempted government censorship of a free press" | White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA)
"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." - https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/trump-white-house-press-pool-access-00206001, This website is unavailable in your location. – WFTV
"The new system amounts to a signal to news outlets to follow the White House line or risk being kicked out as well." - https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/trump-white-house-press-pool-access-00206001
"When the government shuts out journalists explicitly because it dislikes their reporting or political views, that violates the First Amendment. Left unchecked, such a precedent opens the door to broader efforts to manipulate public discourse and undermine press freedom." - White House barring AP from press events violates the First Amendment
"The measures implemented by this White House were clearly aimed at punishing the AP for its editorial choices. One of the fundamental principles of the First Amendment is that the government cannot retaliate against the public or the press for their expressions." - White House says it has the right to punish AP reporters over Gulf naming dispute
"The White House press pool exists to serve the public, not the presidency." - This website is unavailable in your location. – WFTV
"This is viewpoint discrimination based on a news organization's editorial choices and a clear violation of the First Amendment." - White House barring AP from press events violates the First Amendment, The relationship between the White House and its press corps is time-tested — and can be contentious
"This represents a direct challenge to the independence of a free press in the United States. The press pool should never be supplanted by a select group of insiders." - https://www.yahoo.com/news/fox-news-correspondent-slams-trump-230052637/
"The WHCA warned that this decision constitutes a textbook violation of not only the First Amendment, but the president's own executive order on freedom of speech and ending federal censorship." - White House bars Associated Press from spaces like Oval Office and Air Force One
"Neither the courts nor any other branch of the government can be allowed to affect the content or tenor of the news by choreographing which news organizations have access to relevant information." - White House barring AP from press events violates the First Amendment
"It is among the most basic tenets for the First Amendment that government cannot retaliate against the public or the press for what they say." - Perspective: White House and Press Corps Should Practice Transparency, Not Prior Review







'We're the most transparent government in history, we're just efficiently preventing being crowded by reporters and implementing a rota of who will write what we tell them to'
 
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