When Donald Trump travels to New York on Monday ahead of a speech at United Nations General Assembly, he will not be accompanied by a television journalist from one of the five major networks that cover him daily. CNN was the designated television pool reporter, a rotating role in which the network — along with NBC, CBS, ABC, and Fox News — shares footage when the president travels and during events where space is limited. But as of 3:04 p.m. Friday, CNN has been banned from the White House.

CNN, along with the two other exiled outlets, MS NOW and Politico, filed a lawsuit Monday against the Trump administration, arguing that the “ban could not be a more direct assault on the First Amendment nor a more blatant violation of our most fundamental constitutional principles.” The news outlets also allege that the administration is violating the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment by simply yanking away their White House credentials. “Without notice or process, the White House revoked our journalists’ credentials because it objected to our reporting,” the three outlets said in a joint statement. “Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”

The situation on Monday is without recent precedent, according to New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker, who has covered the presidency since the mid-1990s. “For the very time in my experience, the president of the United States will have no television........

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