The same team at the White House that refuses to engage with reporters who state their pronouns in emails also can’t handle reading things that make them look bad.
The White House press team withheld unflattering dispatches from journalists that cover the president—called “pool” reports—this week, according to Oliver Darcy’s Status News.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly called the report a “false narrative.”
“The White House does not intentionally withhold any pool reports,” she wrote in a statement. “President Trump is leading the most transparent administration in history.”
The White House withheld a Monday report noting that it had canceled a press conference with President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It also withheld a Tuesday pool report that said the administration had blocked two Associated Press (AP) journalists from following Trump to an event—the same day a federal court ruled the White House must end the practice of excluding news organizations whose viewpoints it disagrees with.
The press pool is a daily, rotating group of journalists across print, digital, TV, and radio outlets who follow the president and provide reporting that is then used by other journalists who cover the White House.
The move came as the White House and press secretary Karoline Leavitt have tried to control how and which reporters covered the administration.
After barring the Associated Press from White House events and the Oval Office in February, the White House wrestled away control of the press pool from the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) and has touted plans to remake control of the seating chart in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room. The tactics have alarmed press freedom advocates, who say the White House is trying to limit free speech.
Eugene Daniels, the president of the WHCA, said the move was a “perfect example of why the White House Correspondents’ Association for years has provided independent delivery of pool reports.”
“It’s critical that journalists who cover the presidency—and the Americans who rely on their coverage to stay informed—get unfiltered information free from government control,” Daniels told the Daily Beast in a statement.
The revelation also comes days after a federal judge ruled the White House must end its ban on the AP from White House events and the press pool over the news wire’s decision not to use the “Gulf of America” name in its reports.
Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee, said multiple White House officials had engaged in “viewpoint discrimination” by blocking the AP from specific events. The White House has appealed the ruling.
“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,” McFadden wrote. “The Constitution requires no less.”
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