Judge orders Trump White House to restore AP access [View all]
A blow for the First Amendment issued by a trump appointed judge
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5238923-trump-administration-ap-access/
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to restore the Associated Presss access to key White House spaces after it exiled AP reporters over the organizations refusal to use Gulf of America in its popular stylebook.
U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, an appointee of President Trump, directed the White House to resume allowing the AP into the Oval Office, Air Force One and other limited spaces when theyre made available to other press pool members.
The judge also granted the APs request for returned access to events open to all credentialed White House reporters, though it listed several caveats.
This injunction does not limit the various permissible reasons the Government may have for excluding journalists from limited-access events. It does not mandate that all eligible journalists, or indeed any journalists at all, be given access to the President or nonpublic government spaces. It does not prohibit government officials from freely choosing which journalists to sit down with for interviews or which ones questions they answer. And it certainly does not prevent senior officials from publicly expressing their own views, McFadden wrote.
No, the Court simply holds that under the First Amendment, if the Government opens its doors to some journalistsbe it to the Oval Office, the East Room, or elsewhereit cannot then shut those doors to other journalists because of their viewpoints, he wrote. The Constitution requires no less.