White House Says Its Team, Not Reporter Group, Will Determine Press Pool Access

The White House press team, rather than the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA), will determine which media outlets get to participate in its press pool, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Feb. 25.

“A select group of D.C.-based journalists should no longer have a monopoly over the privilege of press access at the White House. All journalists, outlets, and voices deserve a seat at this highly coveted table,” Leavitt told reporters during a Tuesday press briefing.

Leavitt said that legacy media outlets will still be allowed to join the pool, but the White House will continue rotating among the five major television networks while also adding print and radio outlets that had previously been denied access.

The White House press team will decide which outlets get access to the press pool on a “day-to-day basis,” she added.

The WHCA released a statement condemning the White House’s decision to decide which outlets get access to its press pool. 

“This move tears at the independence of a free press in the United States. It suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president. In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps,” the association wrote.

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The journalists who lead the WHCA have “for generations … consistently expanded the WHCA’s membership and its pool rotations to facilitate the inclusion of new and emerging outlets,” the association said.

On Tuesday, Leavitt said the White House wants “more outlets and new outlets to have a chance to take part in the press pool” to cover the administration. 

The comments follow a legal battle between The Associated Press (AP) and the White House after the media group was denied access to the Oval Office and Air Force One following its decision to continue using the name “Gulf of Mexico” for the large Atlantic Ocean basin after President Donald Trump signed an executive order renaming it the “Gulf of America.”

AP previously said it would continue using the “Gulf of Mexico” but would mention the name change because its style book requires that it “must ensure that place names and geography are easily recognizable to all audiences.” Many media organizations use the AP Stylebook as an initial reference source.

The White House urged the judge to deny AP’s request, noting that the media group still has general press access like any other media outlet.

AP has no special right to “unfettered access to the president’s exclusive gatherings, even when other news agencies do not have that right,” the White House argued.

“Most journalists have no routine access to the Oval Office, Air Force One, or the president’s home at Mar-a-Lago,” the White House stated.

“The brief reiterates our position that the government cannot dictate how news organizations report or penalize journalists for not advancing the government’s preferred language,” the association wrote.

“The government should never interfere with the operation of an independent press, nor should it demand that reporters adopt the government’s messaging, framing, and, indeed, ideological worldview.”

Stacy Robinson contributed to this report.