BREAKING: Judge McFadden has *granted * the AP’s injunction against the White House’s ban on access to the Oval Office and East Room.
pic.twitter.com/sH3leAsLvK— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) April 8, 2025
Posted on 04/08/2025 8:33:14 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
This seems, on the surface, like a victory for the legacy media - but it's not the victory they were hoping for. Here's why.
On Tuesday, Judge Trevor McFadden granted the Associated Press (AP) an injunction against the Trump administration's banning them from press events in the Oval Office and the East Room. The AP claimed that the administration blocked their access because of editorial viewpoints, and Judge McFadden agreed. Here's Politico's Senior Political Affairs reporter Kyle Cheney's X thread with some details; this takes a little unpacking.
BREAKING: Judge McFadden has *granted * the AP’s injunction against the White House’s ban on access to the Oval Office and East Room.
pic.twitter.com/sH3leAsLvK— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) April 8, 2025
The decision begins with the reason for the AP's exclusion:
About two months ago, President Donald Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. The Associated Press did not follow suit. For that editorial choice, the White House sharply curtailed the AP's access to coveted, tightly controlled media events with the President. The AP now sues the White House chief of staff, her communications deputy, and the press secretary (collectively, "the Government"), seeking a preliminary injunction enjoining the Government from excluding it because of its viewpoint.
The court, in the form of Judge McFadden, has granted this preliminary injunction; the AP will, for the time being, be back in Oval Office and East Room press briefings.
So, in the halls of the Associated Press building, there is probably some grinning and glad-handing going around. But, at least to a non-legal type (me), it looks like Judge McFadden has left the Trump administration a loophole. The decision continues:
But this injunction does not limit the various permissable reasons the Government may have for excluding journalists from limited-access events. It does not mandate that all eligible journalists, or indeed any journalists at all, be given access to the President or nonpublic government spaces.
Here's the onion:
It does not prohibit government officials from freely choosing which journalists to sit down with for interviews or which ones' questions they answer. And it certainly does not prevent senior officials from publicly expressing their own views. No, the Court simply holds that under the First Amendment, if the Government opens its doors to some journalists - be it to the Oval Office, the East Room, or elsewhere - it cannot then shut those doors to other journalists because of their viewpoints. The Constitution requires no less.
So, if you'll all return your tray tables and seat backs to the upright and locked positions, we'll bring this sucker in.
See Also: AP Manufactures Quote Using Tulsi Gabbard to Discredit Trump
The AP won a round. This is a preliminary injunction, which means that the larger battle remains to be fought. I'm not an attorney, nor do I play one on television, but to this lay observer, it seems pretty obvious that the court is telling the Trump administration, "You have to let them in. You don't have to talk to them. You don't have to answer their questions. And you don't have to grant them interviews." And if the AP asks why they aren't being acknowledged, it doesn't preclude a Trump administration member from telling them something that concludes with the phrase, "...and the horse you rode in on."
This may actually be more satisfying than if the judge had just tossed the AP's case out. Put yourselves in the shoes of an AP reporter at a White House press briefing, knowing that pigs could fly and Hades freeze over before the press secretary, the president, or anyone else is going to acknowledge you exist, much less answer a question - and that you and your network will never again be given any sort of opportunity for a one-on-one interview. I don't know if the Trump administration will take this course to actually freeze the AP out. They may be more forgiving folks than that.
But I know what I would do.
Step One:
Seats should be by lottery, and continuously rotating. That way everybody gets a chance.
Step Two:
Seek out and invite every two-bit podcaster in the world to sign up.
Sit them in the very back of the room with a one legged stool to sit on .
AP is the gold standard for rat propagandists, the worst.
Judge Trevor McFadden is giving aid and comfort to the Enemedia of the United States.
SRO, invite the AP last.
I’ve never understood the need for daily meetings with the press. Send out a written press report every week or so and be done with it. The MSM is going to write whatever they want so let ‘em. Don’t waste the time bandying words with them.
I would lock them all out. I don’t believe there is a law that says a press pool has to travel with POTUS on the government dime. From now on, no press flies on AF1 or if they do, they have to pay a lot to fly essentially on a private plane.
It only looks like that because he’s making it up as he goes along
Man, are you being generous here or what? If it was me, I'd sit them in the very back of the room with just the one leg of the stool to "sit" on ...
Or do what Biden did in 2011 at a fundraiser:
Maybe some kind fellow FReeper can help me out here: Is the AP claiming to be telepathic here? How else can they know the reason for their exclusion?
Or was someone at the WH dumb enough to come out and plainly state this as the reason?
It would be appreciated if anyone could shed any light on this.
Regards,
When I look at the number of people packed like sardines in that room, I think of all the smell coming from those sweaty unwashed bodies.
It requires no such thing at all.
The LAAP-dog media think that freedom of the "press" refers only to them. It does not. The notion that "freedom of the press" refers to the trade of journalism is incorrect. Usage of the phrase "the press" to refer to newspapermen didn't originate until the early 1900s.
The origin of the term "the press" to refer to periodicals and journalism generally (see also the so-called Fourth Estate) didn't begin until the 1800s. The usage in reference specifically to reporters and journalists collectively didn't begin until the early 1900s.
At the time of the Framers of the Constitution, "the press" meant the printing press, and "freedom of the press" meant the right of citizens to publish, sharing their thoughts, opinions, and beliefs beyond the range of simple speech in a town square. Many examples of this were "citizen journalists," journaling the goings on in their communities, and sharing opinions on them with the other colonies.
"Freedom of the press" was meant to ban the federal government from stopping Americans from mass communicating, not to enshrine a special class of "journalists" as watchdogs over the government. All citizens were watchdogs, just as we do here on Free Republic.
Finally, here are some thoughts by Benjamin Franklin on "the court of the press" from a 1789 essay An Account of the Supremest Court of Judicature in Pennsylvania, viz. The Court of the Press.
What's interesting in Franklin's piece is that the "court" he is referring to is the so-called court of public opinion. The "press" is not a class of journalists as it is known today; it was the citizen journalist who had something to say. Quoting Franklin:
In whose favor and for whose emolument this court is established? In favor of about one citizen in 500, who by education, or practice in scribbling, has acquired a tolerable stile as to grammar and construction so as to bear printing; or who is possessed of a press and a few types? This 500th part of the citizens have the privilege of accusing and abusing the other 499 parts, at their pleasure; or they may hire out their pens and press to others for that purpose...
It is not by any Commission from the Supreme Executive Council, who might previously judge of the abilities, integrity, knowledge, &c. of the persons to be appointed to this great trust, of deciding upon the characters and good fame of the citizens; for this court is above that council, and may accuse, judge, and condemn it, at pleasure. Nor is it hereditary, as in the court of dernier resort, in the peerage of England. But any man who can procure pen, ink, and paper, with a press, and a huge pair of BLACKING balls, may commissionate himself: And his court is immediately established in the plenary possession and exercise of its rights.
Just as Franklin suggested, today's "one citizen in 500" class of AP reporter (or Twitter or TikTok or YouTube or Free Republic or DU users...) regularly engage in what Franklin called "the privilege of accusing and abusing the other 499 parts, at their pleasure." In other words, not everyone had access to the "pen, ink, and paper, with a press, and a huge pair of... balls" to advantage themselves of the 1st amendment's right to a free press. It would be wrong to suggest that the other 499 were "infringed" by their lack of access to the same.
And the lack of access to the Associated Press would be a similar case. The banning of the Associated Press from the White House would not abridge the people's access to a free press.
The judge was wrong to think that "freedom of the press" meant some kind of "journalist privilege."
-PJ
Lock CNNs Kaitlyn Collins out
She’s trying to be the next Jim Acosta by interrupting, filibustering, and hogging the limelight
Trump and Karoline have had to shut her down several times
Exactly, the first amendment guarantees freedom of speech and press, it says nothing about the AP is special, or that anyone or everyone has access to the President or press briefing room. There are thousands of journalists and news outlets.
If White House wants set up rotation and when AP is in the room seat them in the back and never ask them a question.
Bunch of self absorbed brats, treat them as such
This is a Gold Star post.
Well done, sir
Just have pressers with no audience.
Say McFadden and the fake media, right away I go to publishing magnate Bernarr MacFadden (born Mc) and his very popular “trash journalism.”
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