On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, an appointee of President Trump, directed the White House to resume allowing the AP into the Oval Office, Air Force One and other limited spaces when they’re made available to other press pool members.
He also granted the AP’s request for access to events open to all credentialed White House reporters, though he listed several caveats.
“This injunction does not limit the various permissible reasons the Government may have for excluding journalists from limited-access events. It does not mandate that all eligible journalists, or indeed any journalists at all, be given access to the President or nonpublic government spaces. It does not prohibit government officials from freely choosing which journalists to sit down with for interviews or which ones’ questions they answer. And it certainly does not prevent senior officials from publicly expressing their own views,” McFadden wrote.
“No, the Court simply holds that under the First Amendment, if the Government opens its doors to some journalists—be it to the Oval Office, the East Room, or elsewhere—it cannot then shut those doors to other journalists because of their viewpoints,” he wrote. “The Constitution requires no less.”
After his initial ruling, the judge paused the order from going into effect until April 13, to give the Trump administration time to appeal.
Scores of news organizations use the AP Stylebook for guidance on spelling, grammar and how to refer to certain people and places, to help ensure such references are widely understood in the U.S. and globally.
Charles Tobin, a lawyer for the AP, said during a hearing last month that the news organization was in the “penalty box” for crossing Trump, which he called “abject retaliation.”
“The White House hasn’t hidden that,” Tobin said. “They’ve doubled down.”
Scores of news organizations use the AP Stylebook for guidance on spelling, grammar and how to refer to certain people and places, to help ensure such references are widely understood in the U.S. and globally.
Charles Tobin, a lawyer for the AP, said during a hearing last month that the news organization was in the “penalty box” for crossing Trump, which he called “abject retaliation.”
“The White House hasn’t hidden that,” Tobin said. “They’ve doubled down.”
AP spokesperson Lauren Easton said the decision affirms the fundamental right to “speak freely without government retaliation.”
“This is a freedom guaranteed for all Americans in the U.S. Constitution,” she said. “We look forward to continuing to provide factual, nonpartisan and independent coverage of the White House for billions of people around the world.”
And the President ought to be able to decide who he lets in and who he does not. Fake news organizations are just that. And they are more trouble than they are worth. Perhaps he should just make statements, and not allow any questions. That way the three ring circus of fake news will be at least muffled between lies.
Why should any press organization be allowed physical access to the White House? Biden didn’t invite conservative press operations to the White House– they were routinely prevented from being present. There are myriad press organizations that would like to obtain such coveted status as a White House press credentials, but the White House has never accommodated them all. The First Amendment gives the press the right to publish freely, but that doesn’t mean that a President has to issue their entity a White House pass. Most of the MSM is hostile to Trump, tried to damage his campaign and propped up senile Joe Biden for 4 yrs. Fortunately, voters saw thru their lies. Trump doesn’t have to reward these purveyors of propaganda and disinformation with access (they all peddled the Russia hoax, Hunter Biden laptop is Russian disinformation hoax & Biden’s not senile hoax)- denying these leftwing propagandists a White House pass is one proper form of punishment for deceiving voters.