The White House barred several of the country’s major media outlets from an off-camera briefing on Friday, a move that came as a continuation of President Trump’s war against the media. Major media including CNN, New York Times, Los Angeles Times and Politico were barred by the White House from attending a press briefing. The blocking of media was done hours after Trump’s most recent rant against news outlets. This was a rare and surprising move that is a first from a US President and it sent shockwaves through democracy.
Trump criticizes media
During his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), President Trump criticized media organizations for posting fake news.
Trump also called the FBI a dangerously porous agency and called for immediate action against information leakers.
In another set of tweets, President Trump blamed a few media outlets for publishing fake news deliberately and hiding the truth. He said in his Twitter message that such media pose a great danger to the country. He continued to tweet that fake news media does not knowingly tell the truth. He added that they don’t represent the people and will never do so. Trump told the conservatives that it is time to take some action against those media.
Sean Spicer worsens media relationship with White House
Just hours after Trump’s speech, Sean Spicer, the Press Secretary of the White House officially blocked top media from covering his daily briefing.
During his briefing, Spicer said that they are aggressively going to push back and added that they are not going to simply sit and allow media to create false stories and false news. Only reporters from a few friendly media organizations were allowed to attend Spicer’s briefing.
Reporters from Times Magazine and Associated Press did not enter the briefing in protest of the exclusions.
There were no reports from the Washington Post as they did not send any reporter to attend that briefing.
Protests start to flow
The executive editor of The Times, Dean Baquet said that nothing like this has ever happened in the history of the President’s office and added they are going to protest against this ban. Marty Baron, the Post’s editor called the ban appalling and added that there is nothing the White House is going to gain from banning media and restricting people from getting access to information. According to Jeffrey Ballou, President of the National Press Club, the ban on media from informal briefings by the White House is very disturbing and unacceptable.