Three US news organizations ask federal court to block White House ban until case is resolved | Today’s news

WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (AP) Three news outlets that President Donald Trump abruptly kicked off the White House grounds this month have asked a federal court to block the ban until the case is resolved, saying the administration has “persistently erratic and inconsistently implemented its ban” despite the court ban — including selectively barring CNN from the White House pool.

“The White House’s words and actions leave no doubt that it will immediately reinstate the full ban on CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO if given the opportunity,” lawyers for CNN, MS NOW and Politico wrote late Monday.

Read also | US court orders Trump to restore CNN, MSNOW and Politico access to the White House

“Because the ban is an unlawful attack on the most fundamental First Amendment freedoms and, if not restrained, will cause irreparable harm to plaintiffs and the public, this court should enjoin its enforcement pending the resolution of this case,” the filing states.

It was the latest development in the saga of the Trump administration and the news media during the second term of his presidency. It’s been a contentious relationship that has raised several First Amendment questions, prompted sanctions and restrictions on White House and Pentagon reporters, and led to several lawsuits winding their way through the federal court system.

A two-week temporary restraining order on Trump’s ban on the three organizations, issued last week by US District Judge Timothy Kelly, restored access to the White House but expires on October 8.

Read also | US judge blocks Trump’s White House media ban, deems it ‘unconstitutional’

In a statement emailed to The Associated Press immediately after the filing, the general counsel for the three news outlets called the ban “a flagrant violation of the First Amendment and due process.”

“The president and his administration have continued to make clear that this ban has only one purpose: to punish reporting he doesn’t like,” attorney Theodore J. Boutrus Jr. said.

“That’s retaliation and discrimination in terms, pure and simple,” Boutrous said. “As the District Court’s temporary injunction expires this week, it is important to ensure that the White House continues to be prevented from implementing this unconstitutional ban on the free press.”

The White House still maintains that access is a privilege, not a right

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The filing came a day after the Trump administration signaled it was not backing down from its claim that the sudden ban, which began on September 19, was justified.

“As far as the White House is concerned, it’s the people’s house,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said Sunday on ABC, citing an argument the administration has made from the start. “Being there is a privilege, not a right.”

Monday’s 42-page filing repeated many of the arguments the intelligence sources made in their original lawsuit against Trump and the White House, filed two days after the reporters were banned.

She also added a reference to the White House broadcast rotation, which has become a battleground in the Trump-media feud in recent days.

The White House, he said, “has continued to err on the side of unpredictable and inconsistent enforcement of its ban, including on September 26 by barring CNN from fulfilling its role as a designated television network provider — to the detriment of CNN, its affiliates and ultimately the American public.”

Read also | Trump’s battle with the White House press

When the ban was put in place, CNN was relieved of its duties as part of the broadcast pool, which consists of five major networks: CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox News. In solidarity, the other networks decided to suspend the pool until CNN was allowed back.

CNN was allowed to report on the president with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the National Archives on Friday. But in a new setback on Saturday, the White House disabled the network for Air Force One, preventing it from covering Trump’s trip to a college football game in Tennessee. The rest of the group refused to provide compensation, in solidarity with CNN.

Blanche also defended the decision. “The president has every right to decide who flies his plane,” he said in an interview Sunday. He added that Trump is “sick and tired of certain media outlets refusing to report accurately.” He added that the news coverage, which he described as “disinformation,” was a national security issue.

“That’s a national security issue when there’s complete misinformation coming out of the White House,” he said.

Kelly threw cold water on that argument in his decision last week granting a temporary restraining order against the White House ban. “The court is skeptical … that defendants’ interest in protecting national security is the real motivation” for removing access, Kelly wrote.

His decision did not directly address the rotation of the TV pool. In the new filing, the plaintiffs describe the important function the pool provides, saying it is an important part of the regular access to the president and his activities that the media has traditionally had — and must be restored.

He highlights the case of Air Force One. “CNN has not received any official communication from the White House explaining her exclusion,” the filing said. “Since CNN was excluded and no replacement was identified, no primary television network provider accompanied the President on the trip.”

The pool access issue presented the networks with difficult choices

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According to a person familiar with the pool’s operations, the networks in the pool have decided to address the ongoing impasse on a case-by-case basis and provide details of ongoing discussions on condition of anonymity.

On Sunday, Fox covered the pool event; on Monday, NBC covered the president in the Oval Office. CNN is in the rotation until Thursday. If a network is again banned from a joint event, the networks will make a joint decision, likely based on coverage of the situation, whether to provide compensation or withhold coverage as they did before.

The issues at stake are difficult. On the one hand, the networks want to take a stand in favor of press freedom and against efforts to intimidate the news. On the other hand, the media has an obvious purpose of providing news to its audience.

Read also | When Trump met with Xi, Politico, MS NOW, CNN denied entry to the White House

“There aren’t many good options,” said David A. Schulz, director of the Media Freedom and Access to Information Clinic at Yale Law School.

Should the White House continue to ban CNN, Schulz said, the networks may choose to “use their market power and say, ‘We’re not going to play ball with you.’

The question, Schulz added, is: “Who will back down first?”

Networks “can feel like they’re between a rock and a hard place,” noted RonNell Andersen Jones, a law professor at the University of Utah.

“Capitulation can be seen as an abandonment of basic components of press freedom,” Andersen Jones said. “But the practicalities of a long White House news blackout are also complicated, and the refusal to cover major news at the highest levels of government could itself feel like a failure to fulfill the goals of democracy.” (AP) FHK