Reporters Committee statement on judge’s order blocking White House ban on CNN, MS NOW, Politico

A federal judge on Tuesday once again blocked the Trump administration from shutting CNN, MS NOW, and Politico out of the White House, ruling that the president’s decision to ban them likely violated their rights under the First and Fifth Amendments.

In a 26-page ruling, Judge Timothy Kelly of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia held that the Trump administration unlawfully retaliated and discriminated against the news outlets for reporting stories that the president deemed unfair, rejecting the government’s claims that the news outlets were barred from accessing the White House because their reporting had posed a threat to national security. He also held that the Trump administration failed to provide fair warning before revoking their press credentials.

The judge previously restored White House access to CNN, MS NOW, and Politico under a temporary order. This latest order extends the news outlets’ access while the case continues to play out in court. 

Reporters Committee President Bruce D. Brown made the following statement:

“The court has put an end to a blatantly unconstitutional attempt to punish news outlets for coverage the president doesn’t like. The decision protects not only CNN, MS NOW, and Politico, but all the other holders of White House passes who continued to work under the threat of retaliation — and of course the public, which deserves timely and accurate information from a press corps free from government intimidation.”

Last month, Reporters Committee, joined by dozens of media organizations, filed two friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the news outlets’ lawsuit challenging the ban. The latest brief argued that the ban is illegal and unconstitutional, and made the case that expelling news outlets from the White House “is part of a broad series of actions the administration has taken in an effort to bend reporting to the will of the President.”