A federal judge on Monday denied the Associated Press’s emergency request to restore full access to Trump administration White House press pool events but ordered an expedited review of the case, citing the serious constitutional questions involved.
U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, an appointee of President Donald Trump, declined to grant the news outlet’s temporary restraining order against the Trump administration but acknowledged the urgency of the matter, setting another hearing for the case on March 20. The First Amendment dispute stems from Trump’s recent executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” and the Associated Press’s refusal to adopt the gulf’s new name.
The White House communications office released a statement after McFadden’s decision, saying, “As we have said from the beginning, asking the President of the United States questions in the Oval Office and aboard Air Force One is a privilege granted to journalists, not a legal right.”
The judge offered several reasons why he did not grant the request to grant emergency relief at this stage, noting he was not convinced that the news wire faced “irreparable harm” because of the ban. He noted reporters can still “get access to the same information” from pool notes that are given to all members of the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA), and noted the organization’s delay in bringing the lawsuit was evidence that it was not injured in a way that required relief more than a week after the White House’s ban.
The Associated Press filed the lawsuit after its reporters were barred from covering Oval Office events and traveling aboard Air Force One. The suit targets three White House aides — press secretary Karoline Leavitt, chief of staff Susan Wiles, and deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich — arguing the ban violates First and Fifth Amendment protections against government interference in press freedoms.
Despite McFadden pushing the next hearing until the middle of next month, he warned that case law on the books does not favor the administration’s effort to block the outlet from accessing the press pool on the basis of its refusal to use the Gulf of America’s new title, noting that the White House may want to adjust its current policies, which currently offer broad discretion to the WHCA to act as a “referee” over press access.
The judge appeared at least somewhat convinced by the administration’s arguments that the president has discretion to discriminate on the basis of content. However, at one point he referred to the administration’s basis for the ban as “problematic,” questioning whether any precedent to date justifies the ban under 5th Amendment due process rights.
ASSOCIATED PRESS SUES 3 TRUMP OFFICIALS OVER PRESIDENTIAL EVENT ACCESS
Lawyers for the administration countered that no media outlet has a constitutional right to “special access” to the president, pointing out that nothing in the Constitution would have required former President Joe Biden to sit down for an interview with conspiracy theorist and InfoWars founder Alex Jones.
The White House Correspondents’ Association and Reuters have publicly supported the Associated Press, warning that the ban could undermine press freedom and distort coverage of the presidency.
