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CNN, MS Now and Politico have said they are suing the Trump administration after the US president banned the news outlets from the White House.
The media groups said on Monday that they were filing the legal action to protect their First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes.
“Without notice or process, the White House revoked our journalists’ credentials because it objected to our reporting,” they said in a statement. “Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”
US President Donald Trump’s announcement last week that he would ban the outlets from covering his administration from within the White House prompted renewed concerns about the erosion of media freedom.
The three media outlets are seeking a temporary order restraining the president from taking any further action to implement the ban and to force the White House to immediately restore press credentials.
The lawsuit alleges that the president and members of his administration banned their reporters “for the express purpose of excluding journalists and news organisations with editorial viewpoints disfavoured by the Trump administration”.
It argues that the outlets “have been suffering serious irreparable harm” since the ban, while the First Amendment injury “poses a substantial threat to the freedom of the press not just for plaintiffs but for all journalists, and harms the public for whom they act as surrogates in reporting on matters of urgent public concern about the government”.
Trump has threatened that other media outlets may be banned in future. The White House Correspondents’ Association has told the administration “to immediately restore” the access of the journalists, while press freedom groups have attacked the move as illegal and unconstitutional.
The US president is already locked in litigation with various media outlets in the US and UK, including the BBC, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. Disney last month sued the Federal Communications Commission over what it called a “retaliatory campaign” against the group’s ABC television networks in relation to the content of its broadcasts.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has opened up the White House press room to bloggers and online influencers seen as more favourable to his administration.
Reporters from the three outlets were unable to enter the White House over the weekend after their badges were immediately revoked. CNN — a longtime target of Trump’s criticism — was removed as the television pool representative for the White House press corps for Trump’s visit to New York on Monday.
Trump accused the three groups on Friday of producing “fiction or lies” about his administration. He did not point to specific stories to back up his statement, though his administration has long railed against coverage it has viewed as critical.
The White House was not immediately available for comment.
