A federal judge in Washington, D.C., denied an appeal to overturn an earlier judge’s ruling allowing President Trump’s White House to restrict The Associated Press’ access to certain White House spaces.
The White House banned the AP from the press pool, a rotating group of reporters covering the president’s daily activities, earlier this year over its refusal to use “Gulf of America” instead of “Gulf of Mexico” in its widely-used Stylebook.
In June, the U.S. Court of Appeals temporarily blocked, an early April order from a district court judge that allowed the AP to regain its access to key White House spaces.
“Whether to embrace these name changes — or even to keep track of them — is at least in part a political choice,” Judge Justin Walker wrote in his opinion this week. “So this case about the AP’s refusal to say ‘Gulf of America’ is a case about the AP’s political speech.”
Trump’s administration has sought to limit access and scrutinize coverage of certain news outlets he feels have covered him unfairly.
On Monday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt cited the judges ruling on the AP case as she announced the administration was banning the Wall Street Journal from covering an upcoming trip Trump is taking to Scotland.
Trump is suing the Journal over a story it published earlier this month alleging he wrote a letter to convicted sex offender Jefferey Epstein. The reporting came as Democrats and MAGA allies alike have pressed the White House for more transparency on its probe into the Epstein case after a controversial memo was released last week.
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