The White House indicated Friday night that CNN would be excluded from the media pool aboard Air Force One for President Donald Trump’s trip Saturday, marking the latest escalation in the administration’s ongoing dispute with the news organization and raising fresh First Amendment concerns.
CNN was replaced by Real America’s Voice News, a conservative network, for Trump’s trip to Knoxville, Tennessee, according to White House guidance. Trump is scheduled to attend the University of Tennessee’s college football game against the University of Texas around midday Saturday.
The decision came hours after journalists from CNN, MS NOW and Politico returned to the White House with television cameras after a federal judge granted the news organizations a temporary reprieve. Trump’s administration had barred the three outlets from the White House grounds last week.
The latest media-access decision adds to a growing confrontation between the administration and news organizations over press access and coverage of the president.
U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly temporarily struck down the ban in an overnight ruling early Thursday, but his decision addressed "hard passes” for access to the White House grounds and did not directly address pool duties.
The temporary order from the judge also said nothing directly about Air Force One.
Theodore Boutrous Jr., the news outlets’ attorney, did not immediately respond to an email or phone call from The Associated Press seeking comment Friday night.
Earlier Friday, on "The Lead with Jake Tapper,” Boutrous said the plaintiffs believe the recent court ruling also covers the issue of pool access.
The White House did not immediately respond to an email from Associated Press (AP) seeking additional details about the decision.
For a while during the day, the U.S. network video pool for the White House was back in operation for the first time since Trump banned the three news outlets in an extraordinary showdown over media access.
At noon on CNN, viewers could see Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping touring the National Archives, along with First Lady Melania Trump and Peng Liyuan, Xi’s wife. The banner along the bottom of the screen read, "Trump and China’s Xi Visit National Archives.” It was a routine report from a state visit, except that CNN had not aired live video of Trump in several days.
"As of now, all systems are go,” said a person familiar with the pool, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the fluidity of the situation.
The pool consists of five major U.S. broadcast outlets that take turns shooting and sharing video. When the White House banned CNN, which belongs to the pool, from White House grounds, along with MS NOW and Politico, the other four pool providers declined to participate in a show of solidarity.
The spot that was meant for CNN on this flight has long been reserved for a member of the U.S. network video pool, which Real America’s Voice News is not part of.
CNN did not comment directly earlier Friday, referring instead to its editorial coverage. But Brian Stelter, the network’s media analyst, posted on X that CNN had a pool assignment at the National Archives event and that the White House had approved the network’s credentials.
Throughout his second term, Trump has increasingly targeted media outlets whose coverage irritates him, taking administrative or legal action against several.
Early last year, he banished AP reporters from White House events because the organization was not abiding by his executive order changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America.” AP’s guidance says to acknowledge the new name when relevant.
The case is on appeal after a federal district judge ruled in AP’s favor.
The press pool was created decades ago by the White House Correspondents’ Association, a group of journalists who cover the president, to ensure that a rotating roster always travels with the president.
The pool distributes in-person reports and imagery to the broader press corps and is designed to help hold the nation’s chief executive accountable on behalf of the American public.
The association did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.