{"id":857829,"date":"2026-09-23T13:58:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T13:58:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/857829\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T13:58:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T13:58:15","slug":"doj-defends-trump-media-ban-cites-national-security-and-says-white-house-access-is-a-privilege","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/857829\/","title":{"rendered":"DOJ defends Trump media ban, cites national security and says White House access is a \u2018privilege\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Department of Justice said in a court filing <\/a>late Tuesday that President Donald Trump has the right to ban media outlets CNN, MSNOW and Politico<\/a> from the White House, calling their access a \u201cprivilege\u201d and citing national security concerns.<\/p>\n

The filing urges a federal judge not to block the ban, <\/a>ahead of a hearing Wednesday on the news organizations\u2019<\/a> request for a temporary order restoring their access.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration argues that the ban does not violate First Amendment protections on press freedom. \u201cAccess to the White House is a privilege\u2014not a right,\u201d the DOJ says in the filing.<\/p>\n

It contends that the three news outlets had \u201cfailed to maintain basic minimum \u2018standards of professionalism and decorum expected of those given access to the White House Complex,\u2019 including, \u201cpublishing sensitive or classified information,\u201d wrote<\/a> DOJ Attorney Michael Velchik.<\/p>\n

The DOJ said the three news organizations were sent individual letters from the White House Press Office earlier Tuesday laying out the reasoning for the revocation of their passes, and citing a \u201cnon-exhaustive list of reporting incidents\u201d the White House said it had found \u201cthreatened national security and spread falsehoods.\u201d <\/p>\n

The letters cite stories on construction details related to the East Wing bunker, funding for the White House ballroom, munitions stockpiles impacted by the Iran war and sanctions against Russia. <\/p>\n

The outlets did not immediately respond to overnight requests for comment from NBC News on the filing\u2019s claims. <\/p>\n

The letters give the news organizations a deadline of 5 p.m. on Friday to \u201ccontest this initial decision.\u201d If the deadline is missed \u201cthis initial decision will be final,\u201d they say.<\/p>\n

01:21<\/p>\n

Rubio defends White House media outlet ban<\/p>\n

00:0000:00<\/p>\n

The decision to ban CNN, Politico and MS NOW came Friday via a Truth Social post<\/a>, where Trump wrote that he was \u201cproud to announce\u201d the ban from the White House \u201ceffective immediately.\u201d <\/p>\n

He said the decision was \u201ca result of their constant \u201creporting\u201d FAKE NEWS! Media Outlets shouldn\u2019t be able to constantly write or report FICTION and LIES when they\u2019re covering the President of the United States, the Trump Administration, or the United States of America.\u201d He added: \u201cOther Fake News Media Outlets to follow.\u201d<\/p>\n

Journalists from the three outlets, including MS NOW reporter Akayla Gardner, CNN\u2019s Betsy Klein and Politico\u2019s Cheyenne Haslett, subsequently found their access passes deactivated and their White House press credentials confiscated. <\/p>\n

First Amendment experts and the White House Correspondents\u2019 Association called the turning away of credentialed reporters unconstitutional. <\/p>\n

CNN, Politico and MS NOW filed their lawsuit Monday arguing that the president\u2019s move violated the defendants\u2019 due process rights and First Amendment protections<\/a> for newsgathering and speech.<\/p>\n

The three outlets said they were filing the lawsuit \u201cto protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes.\u201d<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, who was appointed by Trump in 2017, will preside over the hearing Wednesday. He will evaluate the outlets\u2019 request to issue a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the ban and restoring reporters\u2019 hard passes to access White House grounds.<\/p>\n

Kelly ruled against Trump<\/a> in a similar case back in 2018, when the White House withdrew credentials from reporter Jim Acosta, who was then with CNN. <\/p>\n

\"PresidentPresident Trump speaks to the press at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Tuesday.Charly Triballeau \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Trump remarked <\/a>that he would \u201cprobably\u201d \u200blet journalists from CNN, \u2060MS \u200bNOW and \u200bPolitico back into the White \u200bHouse if \u200ba court rules \u200cagainst \u2060his decision to ban the \u200bmedia \u200boutlets \u2060from the White \u200bHouse grounds.<\/p>\n

Later that day, during his address to the United Nations\u2019 General Assembly in New York, Trump told CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins<\/a>: \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t be here … You said you weren\u2019t going to cover me.\u201d Collins responded that CNN never said it was not going to cover Trump, and that while it had been banned from the White House it was credentialed by the U.N. as usual.<\/p>\n

The solidarity among TV networks<\/a> has been swift, as they refused to provide TV pool coverage of the president\u2019s activities this week, resulting in quiet mics and a lack of photographs of Trump\u2019s official activities. <\/p>\n

Pool coverage is when one network attends an event and then distributes information and media, such as video footage and audio, to other outlets. The system has been recognized by administrations from both parties for decades, and the coverage is used by pool members and subscribers, which includes outlets like Newsmax, One America News Network, C-SPAN and international outlets.<\/p>\n

Print and radio pools are still in place, and TV pools for events for other parts of the administration will continue. Individual TV networks, including NBC News, continue to provide coverage of White House events that are open to the press, outside of the pool. Outside of events, NBC News reporters continue to report on the administration\u2019s activities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Department of Justice said in a court filing late Tuesday that President Donald Trump has the right…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":857830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-857829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=857829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/857830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=857829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=857829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=857829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}