Access to staffing

White House to select journalists itself in future

The White House will soon decide for itself which reporter is allowed into the Oval Office.

(Bild: AP)

In future, the US President himself will choose who is allowed to ask him questions: the government is taking away the independent journalists' association's right to decide which correspondents are allowed to report from the White House or from the presidential aircraft Air Force One. This is a further blow to the freedom of the press. 

The background to this is the dispute with the US news agency AP, which has been going on for weeks and has now also gone to court.

AP reporters no longer enjoy the privilege of access to the Oval Office because the internationally active agency does not use Trump's new designation "Gulf of America" for the waters south of the US coast known internationally as the "Gulf of Mexico". AP and the White House Correspondents Association (WHCA) have taken legal action against this. However, a judge had initially not issued an injunction the previous day.

Access for more media
The "pool" comprises a selection of reporters who attend on behalf of all accredited journalists - for example at events where space is limited - and pass on their information to everyone as part of a standardized procedure. Unlike many others, they have direct access to the President and also have the opportunity to ask questions frequently. The WHCA regulates the composition of the pool by circular resolution.

US President Donald Trump in front of the White House

(Bild: Associated Press)

The White House now wants more media to have access to the pool than before, said White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt in Washington. This applies, among other things, to local radio and television stations that are "close to the people". Many of the local stations belong to the Sinclair media group, which is considered to be strongly right-wing populist and is known for giving its journalists centrally controlled guidelines for reporting.

Reporters Association: Breach of press freedom
The Journalists Association sees the White House's actions as an outright breach of press freedom in the United States. "In a free country, the leadership should not be allowed to decide the composition of reporters," it said in a statement. The US newspaper "New York Times" described the decision in a spokesperson statement on Platform X as an "attempt to undermine the public's access to independent, trustworthy information about the most powerful person in America."

The current reason for the White House's move is the dispute with the US news agency AP, which has been ongoing for weeks and has now also been taken to court. The internationally active agency, which is respected worldwide for its neutrality based on statutes, did not adopt the new designation "Gulf of America" specified by Trump.

Dispute with AP news agency in court
AP continues to refer to the waters south of the US Atlantic coast, internationally known as the "Gulf of Mexico", by the name it has been known by for 400 years. As a result, AP reporters no longer enjoy the privilege of access to the Oval Office. AP and the White House Correspondents Association (WHCA) took legal action against this. However, a judge did not initially impose an injunction against the White House.

Trump himself said that he believed the Associated Press was part of the "radical left". He described an unnamed AP reporter as a "radical left-wing nut job". "They're not treating us fairly."