Judge Orders White House to Restore Press Passes for Three Outlets

By Andrew Powell (/journals/andrew-powell)

A federal judge has temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s decision to bar CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House, ordering the administration to restore the outlets’ press credentials while their lawsuit moves forward. According to Fox News, the temporary restraining order issued Thursday will remain in effect for 14 days unless the court changes it. U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly directed White House officials to “immediately return, reinstate, and restore” the hard-pass credentials held by employees of the three organizations. Kelly said the outlets had met the legal standard required for the temporary order. In his ruling, Kelly wrote that the news organizations were likely to succeed in showing that their hard passes had been revoked without constitutionally adequate due process. He described that as a high legal bar but concluded that the plaintiffs had met it. The judge also addressed the administration’s national security argument. Kelly wrote that the record before him did not provide factual support for the claim that revoking the credentials protected national security or that restoring the passes would create a national security danger. Trump announced the restrictions Sept. 18, accusing the three outlets of repeatedly reporting what he described as “fiction and lies.” Reporters from CNN, MS NOW and Politico were subsequently turned away from the White House after their credentials were deactivated or confiscated. The organizations, along with three individual reporters, sued the administration in federal court. They argued that the decision violated their First Amendment rights and Fifth Amendment due process protections, while the administration maintained that access to the White House is a privilege rather than a guaranteed right. The dispute centers partly on how much authority the White House has over access for credentialed journalists. Reuters reported that legal experts have pointed to longstanding limits on government decisions that condition press access on the viewpoint or content of coverage, while also noting that presidents have greater control over limited-access settings such as the Oval Office. The conflict also disrupted the White House television press pool. FOX News Media, ABC News, CBS News, CNN and NBC News announced Monday that they would suspend their pooled coverage after CNN was excluded. Kelly’s order does not resolve the underlying lawsuit. Instead, it preserves White House access for the affected outlets for now as the broader legal dispute continues.