The White House has barred CNN from flying aboard Air Force One on Saturday as the network was scheduled to perform its duties as part of the television press pool covering President Donald Trump.
CNN was expected to accompany Trump on his trip to Tennessee for a college football game as part of the White House TV press pool, a small rotating group of journalists responsible for covering the president when space is limited and sharing the material gathered with other television networks.
The decision was announced in a White House note on Friday night outlining Trump’s schedule. No other television outlet was named to replace CNN, meaning the president’s trip will have no television pool coverage.
The latest move is another development in the Trump administration’s ongoing dispute with CNN and other members of the White House press corps.
Last week, Trump announced that CNN, MS NOW and Politico were being banned from the White House. The decision also stopped CNN from flying on Air Force One and carrying out its scheduled pool duties during Trump’s visit to New York for the United Nations General Assembly.
A judge later blocked the administration from enforcing the ban against the three outlets and ordered the restoration of credentials for the affected reporters. However, questions remained about whether the ruling also covered participation in the White House press pool.
Following CNN’s removal, Fox, NBC, ABC and CBS declined to take over the network’s scheduled pool responsibilities until CNN and the other affected outlets regained regular access.
The normal arrangement resumed on Friday, when CNN participated in the pool as Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping visited the National Archives.
It was not immediately clear what effect the latest decision would have on the legal battle involving CNN, MS NOW and Politico. The lawyer representing CNN had previously told anchor Jake Tapper that he believed the restoration of access also covered the White House pool.
MS NOW and Politico participate in separate pool rotations from the five major television networks.
A judge has given the news organisations until Monday to file a request for a preliminary injunction, which could prevent Trump’s proposed ban from being enforced for a longer period.
The television pool is a key part of presidential coverage because it provides video footage and information about Trump’s speeches and public appearances to news organisations across the United States and around the world.
“The system that allows the networks to share video of the president with the whole country. If they aren’t there, the pool can’t function,” the current president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, Jacqui Heinrich, said on “Fox News Sunday.”
“And America cannot have state TV,” CBS journalist Weijia Jiang, who previously served as WHCA president, said.
“That’s what makes America America,” she said. “That’s why we need independent coverage, and that’s why this press pool system has been set up for so long and why it works – because you need independent actors to be able to be the observers.”
Apart from television journalists, the White House press pool also includes print, radio and still photography journalists. The system allows media organisations to cover presidential events held in locations where there is not enough room for the entire press corps.
The Trump administration also produces its own coverage, including live streams of presidential events.
However, Jiang said, “if the government is only showing you what it wants, then you have to question, what are we missing? And that’s what the pool, that’s what these outlets bring to the table.”
