Judge declines to immediately restore AP’s access to Trump events

WASHINGTON – A federal judge cleared the way Monday for the White House to continue barring The Associated Press from covering news events with President Donald Trump, extending a legal fight over freedom of speech and press access.

The AP sued several top Trump administration officials last week, accusing them of violating the First and Fifth Amendments by barring its reporters from press events. The White House began turning away the wire service’s reporters this month, raising objections to its editorial decision to continue to refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its coverage, rather than calling the body of water the Gulf of America.

Judge Trevor McFadden of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, who was appointed by Trump, said the AP’s circumstances were “not the type of dire situation” that would require emergency intervention against the White House, in part because the organization could still report the news through shared reports sent out to all media organizations in the White House Correspondents’ Association.

While McFadden said he was hesitant to immediately force the Trump administration’s hand, he seemed sympathetic to arguments against the White House, including that its actions appeared to be intended to coerce or punish the news organization over a language choice, which, he repeatedly said, amounted to “viewpoint discrimination.”

After reading his ruling, he warned the lawyer representing the Trump administration that legal precedent from other cases in which the White House had banned specific reporters was “uniformly unhelpful to the White House.” He ordered an expedited hearing to consider an injunction against the Trump administration, before which both sides could introduce more evidence.

“It might be a good idea for the White House to think about whether what they’re doing is really appropriate given the case law,” he said.

The Associated Press had requested a restraining order to prevent the White House from excluding its journalists from events where the president routinely makes news.

Lawyers defending the Trump administration had argued that it was the president’s prerogative to choose which members of the news media to allow into otherwise restricted areas.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.