A U.S. federal judge has extended White House access for three news organizations that President Donald Trump had sought to bar. According to Judge Timothy Kelly of the U.S. District Court, Trump likely broke the law when he ordered that journalists from CNN, MS Now and Politico be banned from attending White House press briefings.
The ruling, issued late Tuesday, expands on an emergency order Kelly handed down on September 24 that temporarily restored access for the outlets.
According to the ruling, Trump likely discriminated against the news organizations based on their viewpoints, in violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Kelly wrote that banning the outlets from the White House rested on the view that their coverage is generally inaccurate and biased against him.
When announcing the ban, Trump said the outlets "should not be allowed to continually write or report false and dishonest stories when they report on the President of the United States." The Justice Department later said the reporters' White House passes were revoked on national security grounds.
In his ruling, Kelly rejected that argument. He wrote that there was no evidence in the record that Trump decided to revoke the plaintiffs' regular passes for national security reasons in the first place, and that at no point did he directly state national security as the reason for his decision.
The latest order remains in effect until Kelly — who was appointed by Trump during his first term — issues a final ruling in the case, or until an appeals court intervenes.
Trump has long been a critic of the mainstream U.S. media and has previously sought to limit access for certain outlets. He has also repeatedly attacked individual reporters both in person and on social media, and has sued numerous media companies.
At an October 8 hearing, Theodore Boutrous, a lawyer for the three banned outlets, said Trump was seeking to "coerce coverage in a more favorable direction."
The Freedom of the Press Foundation was among the organizations that welcomed the court's latest ruling. Caitlin Vogus, the foundation's senior advocacy counsel, said in a statement that the fight is far from over, and that there is ample reason to expect the administration to appeal Kelly's new order and to keep blocking CNN and Politico from joining pooled coverage of the president. She stressed that Trump cannot trample on the First Amendment's core protections by hand-picking his own press corps or turning pooled reporting duties into a reward for favorable coverage.
