The White House removed reporters from HuffPost, Reuters, and a foreign press representative from the press pool covering President Donald Trump’s first Cabinet meeting on Wednesday. The decision comes as White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt reaffirmed the administration’s stance that it has the authority to select which outlets are allowed to cover the president in limited-space events. This change was made on Tuesday of this week when the White House stripped the White House Correspondents Association from making those decisions and took the roll on themselves.
According to a report from the Daily Mail, the three reporters were informed by White House press aides before the meeting that they would not be permitted to join the pool. The reporters were kicked out alongside the Associated Press reporter and photographer who were removed indefinitely after the AP refused to use the term “Gulf of America” instead of “Gulf of Mexico” in its reporting. This week, a judge temporarily upheld the White House's stance on that pending a further hearing.
HuffPost White House reporter SV Date, who had been scheduled to serve as the outlet’s pool representative, was replaced by an Axios reporter. Speaking to reporters in the briefing room, Date expressed frustration over the decision. As part of their argument to ban the AP, the White House said in a brief that the AP still had access to pool reporting.
