The Trump administration is appealing a court ruling that it must restore the Associated Press’ access to the White House “immediately.”
AP was banned from the White House in February for refusing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America,” and on Tuesday the outlet won an important court victory in the lawsuit it filed in response when U.S. District Judge Trevor N. McFadden, a Trump appointee as it turns out, ruled that the ban violates the first amendment.
“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,” McFadden wrote. “The Constitution requires no less.”
But on Wednesday, lawyers working for the government filed paperwork to appeal on behalf of White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, White House chief of staff Susan Wiles and deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich, the three individuals named in the AP lawsuit.
It’s not yet known on what grounds the administration will appeal, though McFadden did clarify that his ruling “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.”
Meanwhile, Oliver Darcy reported Wednesday that the administration has continued blocking AP in violation of the order.
The AP’s White House ban was only the first of several direct attacks on media the Trump administration considers unfriendly to him, attacks that escalated until the administration made the White House Correspondents Association moot by taking full control of the press pool rotation of reporters.
WHCA, in response, essentially waved a white flag, telling members, “Each of your organizations will have to decide whether or not you will take part in these new, government-appointed pools.”
Since then, the organization has retreated further from confrontation, canceling the planned headlining set by comedian Amber Ruffin at the upcoming 2025 White House Correspondents Association Dinner. This decision was, the organization said, to “ensure the focus is not on the politics of division.”
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