Key takeaways:
- ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC suspended presidential TV pool coverage after CNN was blocked from fulfilling its scheduled pool duties Monday.
- CNN, MS NOW and Politico filed a lawsuit seeking to restore White House access, arguing the ban violates the First Amendment.
- The Washington Post said it would withhold photographs of Trump and his events until after midnight Tuesday in support of the barred outlets.
The television press pool covering President Trump suspended its coverage Monday after the White House barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from access, leaving no network TV pool team to travel with the president as he headed to New York for the United Nations General Assembly.
The move disrupted a decades-old system in which major television networks take turns covering the president’s events and travel, then share video with other news organizations. CNN had been scheduled to serve as Monday’s pool broadcaster and accompany Trump to New York, where he is expected to attend the U.N. General Assembly on Monday and Tuesday before returning to Washington.
Five networks — ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC — issued a joint statement objecting to the ban.
“The public has a vital interest in receiving accurate, independent information about its government,” the networks said. “No administration should reject a news organization because it objects to its reporting.”
Bryan Boughton, Fox News’s Washington bureau chief and the TV pool chair, told pool members in an email that the television pool would stop covering events designated for presidential pool coverage, The Guardian reported.
“Effective today, the TV pool will not be covering events designated as pool coverage of the President,” Boughton wrote, according to The Guardian. “This follows the White House’s position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties.”
The suspension affected White House coverage almost immediately. The Guardian reported that viewers watching a White House feed of Trump’s midday ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new White House helipad could see the president speaking but could not hear his remarks clearly over the sound of a helicopter engine.
Print, radio and wire service pool coverage continued Monday, The Guardian reported. Network pool coverage also continued for other top government officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance, according to CBS News.
Trump announced Friday that he was “banning Fake News CNN, MSNOW … and Politico … from the White House as a result of their constant ‘reporting’ FAKE NEWS!” The Guardian reported that Trump also said the organizations “constantly write or report FICTION and LIES.”
On Saturday, reporters from CNN, MS NOW and Politico were turned away from the White House, CBS News reported. The three news organizations filed a lawsuit Monday seeking to restore access, arguing that the ban violates the First Amendment. Their complaint said there “could not be a more direct assault on the First Amendment.”
Trump defended the ban on Truth Social, saying he was not “instituting an assault on the Free Press” and describing the decision as a response to “national security” threats, The Guardian reported.
The Washington Post said Monday that it would not publish photographs of Trump or his events until after midnight Tuesday as part of a collective effort with other White House photographers to support the barred news organizations.
Jacqui Heinrich, president of the White House Correspondents’ Association and a senior Fox News correspondent, said Saturday that the White House “cannot deny that access arbitrarily or based on the content of their reporting.”
The presidential press pool system has been in place since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration. It is designed to ensure that journalists are present when the president travels or appears at events, including during unexpected breaking news. It also addresses space limits in areas such as the Air Force One press cabin, where not every network can fit.
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