WASHINGTON — The Associated Press and the Trump administration held discussions in federal court on Thursday in a lawsuit that could change decades-old established press access in the White House.
District of Columbia US District Judge Trevor McFadden has heard more about Associated Press White House reporters and photographers joining his competitors and witnessing President Donald Trump’s incident in the oval office, including his witnesses.
The two journalists and other Associated Press reporters have also been denied entry to most large White House events, including tarmac for the East Room and one Air Force departure.
The Associated Press, who has been a member of the White House pool pool since the 19th century, argues that the sudden ban violates the First Amendment and legitimate process rights and undermines competitiveness as a wire service that reaches thousands of newsrooms.
The AP continues to have access to Daily White House press conferences and driveways near the West Wing entrance, with other journalists with over 1,000 journalists holding “hard passes” to the General White House complex.
The press is seeking a preliminary injunction requiring APs to be banned from events open to a limited number of eligible presses, and has withdrawn its policy of excluded outlets from the smaller Daily White House press pool. Such measures could last until final judgment is reached.
McFadden, appointed by Trump to the DC Circuit in 2017. Confirmed By 84-10 votes in the Senate, the parties asked to halt other evidence submissions, allowing him to take control in a timely manner.
On February 24th, McFadden’s hearing It was rejected A request for a temporary restraining order that required the White House to immediately restore access to oval offices, Air Force 1 and other locations.
“The president wasn’t happy.”
Zeke Miller, the chief correspondent of the White House, testified that Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt summoned him on February 11, saying that the AP continued to use the name Gulf of Mexico after he had it and that “the president was not happy.” order The seas along the US coast should be called the American Gulf.
“He decided that the oval office would not be allowed to do so that we would not change our policy and that we would need to ‘act quickly’ (change it),” Miller recalled Leavitt’s message.
The AP has not changed its style guidance as the Gulf of Mexico shares the border with Cuba within its range. The Associated Press reaches global clients and readers who have been recognizing the waters as the Gulf of Mexico for centuries.
When asked by the Associated Press’s lawyers if the new policy chilled the Associated Press’s coverage, Miller said “no doubt our report is suffering.”
For just over 12 years, Miller, a White House reporter, said he regularly watches his news alerts pop up on his phone before February 11th, saying “while the event is still ongoing.”
Wire services, which send news and photos to subscriber members around the world in near real time, are now spending their time either independently verifying reports from other outlets or relying on delayed video feeds that do not show that there are others elsewhere in the president or his environment.
“I don’t know what other outlets are including or not,” he said. In particular, those outlets said they might fear the “viewpoint discrimination” that the Associated Press is facing from the Trump administration.
Miller testified that neither he nor his White House colleagues have been permitted since February 11 with other reporters in the oval office, and have intermittently allowed press conferences with foreign leaders and rituals in larger spaces, including an East Room that can accommodate more than 100 journalists.
The news outlet had to fly US foreign correspondents to be part of the foreign press permitted at the elliptical office during a visit from Ukrainian President Voldy Mie Zelensky, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Kierstama, according to the news organization.
The White House has confirmed the AP photographer to several events in the East Room, but has been locked out of other events.
Evan Vucci, the Washington chief photographer of the Associated Press, testified, “There is no rhyme or reason.” “The only thing that’s consistent” is that the AP has been targeted, Vocch said.
White House Defense
The government called for witnesses but instead submitted a last-minute supplemental declaration on Wednesday from Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budwich and Chief Cabinet Secretary, the chief defendant in the case.
The AP moved to declare on Wednesday.
Budowich claims wire services, television and radio correspondents and printing reporters who made up a small pool that “will continue to be subject to pool selection under the old system and in the new system.”
On February 25th, Leavitt announced that the White House will select journalists who have access to the oval office and the Air Force from now on.
An independent group of journalists has been self-governing since the Eisenhower administration, based on the principle that the press, not the president, should decide the composition of the press that accompany the president.
Under the new pool system, White House officials said in his declaration, “by pairing the topics of each event with audiences who are most interested in reporters and audiences, we were able to perform our work better by creating the perfect pool for the public.”
But Associated Press Attorney Charles Tobin said he “just can’t stand it.”
View a list of journalists who have chosen to join the pool on February 28th – the day of the explosive oval office meeting between Trump and Zelensky – Tobin pointed out that the White House chose the Los Angeles era as its room.
However, for the past few months, the LA Times’ Ukrainian coverage consisted of republication of the AP Wire Services supply, he said.
By banning the AP, the White House allegedly claimed Tobin, a law firm at Ballard Spura.
Tobin also said he would not buy Budwich’s claim that the Associated Press is eligible for a small press pool, pointing to the Deputy Chief of Staff’s public social media posts and statements from other White House officials to the president.
“If he says that doesn’t constitute a ban, then that’s exactly what he’s saying, so we don’t speak the same language,” Tobin said.
In his final statement, Brian Hudak, a US lawyer for the District of Columbia, said, “I’m not saying they can’t be made public (what they want), I’m just saying, ‘I can’t go here’.”
Hudak also added that the president wants to select “a specific population of journalists” within his powers.
“I don’t think that would anger the First Amendment Constitution,” Hudak said.
How did it begin?
President Donald Trump signed an executive order for the US Gulf several hours after his inauguration, which was renamed to US coastal waters along Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. He also restored the name of Mount Denali in Alaska to Mount McKinley.
The AP advised that journalists around the world publish editorial guidelines and continue the notation that they used the Gulf of Mexico to rename some of the waters along the US coast.
However, the outlet issued guidance for journalists to use the name Mount McKinley, as the president can completely change locations within the United States.
To avoid the lawsuit, Julie Pace, the outlet’s executive editor, contacted Trump administration officials to discuss the lawsuit against the Associated Press. However, according to court documents, the Associated Press eventually filed a lawsuit on February 21st, as the White House and Trump “doubling” new policies.
White House Chief of Staff Susan Wills told Pace on February 18 that the AP Stylebook, a detailed online and printing guide for reporters and editors, was “misused and sometimes weaponized to promote a divisive, partisan agenda.”
That same day, Trump said the White House “stopped out the AP until it agrees that it’s the Gulf of America.”
As of the court on March 3rd Submitthe AP said it is still banned from pools and larger events.
The outlet wrote, “We have repeatedly explained to the government that the government has repeatedly explained to the government that it seeks to control the language used by journalists, and that it will exclude those journalists and retaliate against them when they fail to comply.”
March 17th declaration Miller listed dozens of events covered in the White House press pool, and the Associated Press was denied access during the president’s trip.
Except for journalists for what they wrote
The AP alleges that the Trump administration violated the outlet’s Fifth Amendment protections when the White House banned journalists from events open to other reports on “arbitrary and point-of-view reasons” without giving written warnings and challenges.
The outlet has a free interest in exercising its First Amendment rights, and therefore must receive a legitimate process if the government seeks to rob its constitutional rights. And the AP points to the precedent set by DCCIRCUIT that freedom interest in exercising freedom of speech extends to newspaper totals.
Sherillv. Citing Night’s 1977 DC Circuit Judgment (a recited important decision), the AP argued:
In that case, the Circuit ruled that the press qualification to the White House cannot be denied without procedural protection, and that “protections require that this access not be denied arbitrarily or on unconvincing grounds by providing news savings under the First Amendment guarantee of press freedom.”
However, the White House argues that the Associated Press does not have a free interest in “the president has access to special media.”
“The Associated Press journalists continue to enjoy the same general media access as all other hardpass owners in the White House press facility, and continue to provide special access to the president. Opposition briefs.
Case JB Pictures, Inc., 1996. v. Quoting from the Department of Defense, the White House argued that “the First Amendment does not provide journalists with the right to access government property and information rather than to public members, even though government access to information could lead to more thorough or better reporting.”
White House press also argue that the president has the discretion to join him in the “most intimate of his work and personal space.”
Press pool history
For decades, the White House Correspondents Association has included three Wire Service reporters from the Associated Press, Reuters and Bloomberg Daily Pool. Four photographers from the Associated Press, Reuters, Agence France-Presse and The New York Times. Rotation of three television network journalists, radio correspondents and printing reporters; Amikos Brief Submitted by the organization.
Wire services regularly included in the pool have the largest reach of all news outlets covering the White House. This is why the association constitutes the pool as is, according to court filings.
Last updated at 5:51pm, March 27, 2025
