US judge allows CNN, MS NOW and Politico reporters to keep White House access

A US federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to allow CNN, MS NOW and Politico to access the White House while their lawsuit against US president Donald Trump’s press ban proceeds, ruling that the restrictions likely violated the First Amendment.US district Judge Tim Kelly said Trump’s own public comments suggested that the ban was imposed in retaliation for reporting he considered inaccurate or biased against him. The judge said this established a likely link between the outlets’ protected speech and the revocation of their White House press passes.“President Trump likely banned Plaintiffs from the White House because he believes that their reporting is generally inaccurate and biased against him,” Kelly wrote in his order.Kelly’s ruling extends his earlier decision blocking the ban, which was due to expire on Tuesday, and sets the stage for a possible appeal by the administration. The judge, who was appointed by Trump during his first term, rejected the Justice Department’s argument that national security concerns had partly motivated the restrictions.He said there was no evidence that Trump had initially revoked the outlets’ press passes on national security grounds.

The administration had also failed to identify specific classified or sensitive information allegedly disclosed in the reports it cited to justify the ban, Kelly wrote.Trump announced the ban on September 18 and has repeatedly defended it by criticising the outlets’ coverage as negative, one-sided or biased. The Justice Department later cited reports concerning the Iran war, construction of the East Wing ballroom and the Republican midterm convention as part of its national security justification.The judge said he took the government’s responsibility to protect classified information seriously, but found little evidence to support its national security argument in this case. He also noted that the administration had not submitted supporting material for the claim, even under seal for the court’s review.Kelly had previously ordered the administration to reactivate the outlets’ press passes on due process grounds, finding that they had not received fair notice of the rules before their access was revoked.

He said letters explaining the ban, sent after the outlets filed their lawsuit, did not adequately remedy those shortcomings.Ted Boutrous, the lawyer representing the media organisations, welcomed the ruling, being quoted by CNN, saying Trump had repeatedly acknowledged that the ban was intended to punish reporting he disliked and pressure journalists to cover him in ways he preferred.The outlets have argued that the restrictions harmed not only their ability to report on the president but also had a chilling effect on other news organisations.At a hearing last Thursday, Kelly had questioned the administration’s changing explanations for the ban. He noted that the president appeared to have publicly cited one set of reasons for the decision while government lawyers were now advancing another.Justice Department attorney Michael Velchik argued that the president had discretion to remove reporters or news organisations from the White House, adding that Trump had criticised CNN for years. Boutrous countered that Trump had personally issued the ban and repeatedly stated his reasons for doing so.