Court blocks Trump’s White House ban on CNN, MS, NOW, Politico
Federal Judge Timothy Kelly has ordered the Trump administration to temporarily reinstate CNN, MS, NOW and Politico’s access to the White House after they were banned from the premises by President Donald Trump.
In the ruling issued early Thursday, Kelly found the revocation of reporters’ press badges was done without “constitutionally adequate due process.”
The ruling – which comes just hours before Trump is set to welcome Chinese leader Xi Jinping – means journalists should now be able to return to work at the White House complex. Kelly said that the government’s arguments “offer little to back up their asserted national security interest.”
After the ban went into effect, Trump and his lawyers said the outlets had their access revoked because their past reporting raised national security concerns.
“For one thing, nothing in the record that predates this suit suggests that the revocation of Plaintiffs’ hard passes was motivated by national security concerns,” Kelly wrote. “Certainly, that is not what President Trump said when he announced that he was ‘banning’ Plaintiffs from the White House -instead, he focused on the alleged lack of truthfulness and negativity of Plaintiffs’ reporting.”
“And even the justifications provided to Plaintiffs after this case was filed are ambiguous about the true purpose of the revocations: while Defendants’ letters to Plaintiffs mention national security concerns, they purport to identify reporting that ‘threatened national security and/or spread falsehoods,’ leaving open the possibility that all the stories fall into the later bucket, rather than the former.”
As for due process, the Trump administration didn’t notify the reporters of an opportunity to appeal his decision until after the passes were confiscated, the judge noted.
“The ‘general rule’ is that ‘individuals must receive notice and an opportunity to be heard before the Government deprives them’ of a constitutionally protected interest,” Kelly wrote in his ruling citing case law.
Kelly’s temporary restraining order is in effect for 14 days.
His decision isn’t immediately able to be appealed, the judge noted. In the opinion, the judge set up a plan over the next two weeks for the news outlets and the Trump administration to continue making arguments and submitting to him evidence.
That plan – for which the judge hasn’t yet specified specific deadlines or other hearings – would likely result in a more robust opinion than the emergency decision Kelly made early Thursday morning.
Trump announced the ban of the three outlets in a social media post Friday, writing that he was kicking the news outlets out “as a result of their constant ‘reporting’ FAKE NEWS!” and adding “Other Fake News Media Outlets to follow.”
The three news outlets sued, requesting the ban be paused or blocked entirely. In court filings and during a hearing Wednesday, an attorney for the outlets argued the ban contradicted prior court rulings, violated due process and was issued merely because of Trump’s disdain for the journalists.
Attorneys for the administration countered, saying that Trump’s decision did include an appeals process, pointing to the letters that were received by the outlets after the ban went into effect.
Responding to Thursday’s ruling, Ted Boutrous, the lawyer representing the news outlets, told CNN: “This is a strong ruling vindicating freedom of the press, due process and the rule of law. We greatly appreciate the court’s swift action.”
During Wednesday’s hearing on the motion for a temporary restraining order, Justice Department attorney Michael Velchik argued that CNN, MS NOW and Politico had endangered national security with their reporting and that Trump has the right to decide who can have access to the White House.
Boutrous said during the hearing that “the first mention of national security in this case” occurred days after the announced ban and following the current lawsuit against the administration. Boutrous said it seemed as if “a light bulb went off” in the administration to adopt the national security argument to justify the ban post hoc.
Boutrous also argued the news organizations were only provided letters from the White House outlining why they had been banned days after the ban was announced and following their lawsuit.
