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Courts weigh White House work-arounds to keep AP iced out  

3 21
19.04.2025

The White House’s battle with The Associated Press is far from over.

Though a judge ordered key officials to restore the wire service’s access to certain White House spaces, the Trump administration has found work-arounds to keep the AP iced out in certain places over its refusal to use the term Gulf of America in its popular stylebook.

Two courts in Washington are still weighing in on whether the efforts to shut out the AP are lawful.

U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, a President Trump appointee, ruled last week that the White House must let the AP into limited spaces like the Oval Office and Air Force One when they’re made available to other members of the press pool, a small group of journalists who document the president’s activity in and around the White House.

The White House quickly appealed the decision but, days later, instituted a new pool policy eliminating a permanent slot for all wire services.

Wire services, like the AP, are still eligible for selection as part of the pool’s daily print journalist rotation. But the outlet’s lawyers argued that the decision was made for the “express purpose” of diminishing the outlet’s opportunities to cover the president.

At a hearing Friday over the matter, AP lawyer Charles Tobin called it a “spit in the court’s........

© The Hill