Three news organizations whose journalists were banned from the White House last week are suing President Donald Trump and three top advisers, calling the abrupt lockout a “direct assault on the First Amendment.”
POLITICO, CNN and MSNOW said in a joint statement Monday that they are bringing the federal lawsuit in a bid to immediately restore access for their reporters, who were denied entry to the White House complex on Saturday and had their credentials confiscated by the Secret Service.
“This morning, we notified the government that we are filing a lawsuit today to protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes,” the news organizations said. “Without notice or process, the White House revoked our journalists’ credentials because it objected to our reporting. Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”
The organizations are asking a judge on the U.S. District Court in Washington. to quickly rule Trump’s ban unconstitutional and prevent his aides from enforcing it.
White House and Department of Justice spokespeople did not immediately return requests seeking comment.
The White House’s exclusion of the journalists followed an announcement from Trump on Truth Social Friday that he was banning reporters for the three outlets “effective immediately.”
Trump’s post was vague about the reasons for the ban, beyond complaining about “constant ‘reporting'” of what he called “FAKE NEWS!” as well as “FICTION and LIES.” During an Oval Office photo op Friday, Trump offered few specifics.
“It’s really just cumulative stories over the last few years. You get sick of it,” Trump said. “They’re smart people, but they purposely write negative news.”
The news organizations, represented by Theodore Boutros, Jr. of law firm Gibson Dunn, are filing suit against Trump, chief of staff Susie Wiles, White House Communications Director Steven Cheung and Secret Service Director Sean Curran. The news outlets argue that the president’s ban violates the Constitution in multiple ways: The abrupt cancellation of White House access without notice violated the organizations’ Fifth Amendment due process and property rights, and the retaliation for the content of their reporting violated their First Amendment rights.
The suit contends that the ban is already “severely impeding” the news organizations’ ability to report on the Trump White House while also causing a chilling effect among other news outlets, who could find themselves similarly locked out if the president deems their coverage “insufficiently favorable.”
Though longstanding legal precedents permit the White House to restrict journalists’ access to the building, courts have ruled that officials can’t apply those restrictions in ways that discriminate based on viewpoint or content.
Previous efforts by Trump to deny access to specific reporters or news organizations have run into resistance in the courts, although the most recent litigation led to a muddled result.
In 2018, during Trump’s first term, officials suspended the White House hard pass of then CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta, with officials contending he kept speaking and clung to the microphone after Trump made clear he was moving on to another reporter. A judge ordered Acosta’s credential restored, citing a murky process surrounding the suspension.
A similar fight played out the following year, following a verbal altercation in the Rose Garden between a freelance journalist for Playboy, Brian Karem, and Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka. A federal judge ordered the White House to return Karem’s credential, concluding that the rules of decorum for such events were not clear enough to provide due process.
Last year, another legal clash erupted after Trump barred the Associated Press from attending East Room events and kicked the wire service out of the White House press pool, the small group of reporters routinely given access to the Oval Office, Air Force One and other sensitive locations frequented by the president. Trump’s action came after the AP refused to adopt Gulf of America, after he signed an executive order renaming the body of water long known as the Gulf of Mexico.
Though a federal district judge sided with the AP, the bulk of his ruling was temporarily put on hold by a panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which found the most restricted areas such as the Oval Office and Air Force One were not subject to the broader First Amendment protections of the rest of the complex.
“These restricted presidential spaces are not First Amendment fora opened for private speech and discussion,” the panel’s majority wrote. “The White House therefore retains discretion to determine, including on the basis of viewpoint, which journalists will be admitted.”
Although the appeals court’s June 2025 ruling was a preliminary one, it allowed Trump to follow through with his attempt to ban the AP from the Oval Office. The AP asked the D.C. Circuit’s full bench to take up the issue, but a majority of the court’s judges declined to do so.
Arguments aimed at a definitive ruling on the AP’s lawsuit took place before a three-judge panel last November. The court has yet to rule.
The D.C. Circuit ruled almost a half-century ago in a case involving Nation magazine reporter Robert Sherrill that journalists can’t be denied access to the White House arbitrarily or based on the content of their reporting.
This story originally appeared on POLITICO and is courtesy of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, which harnesses the resources of the company’s newsrooms to publish ambitious scoops, investigations, interviews, opinion pieces, and analysis. It allows journalists — including those from POLITICO, Business Insider, WELT, BILD, Onet, and Fakt — to collaborate on major stories for an international audience of hundreds of millions across platforms.
