For 111 years, media have been arranging each other which reporters are allowed to enter the Oval Office and ask questions there. But American President Donald Trump is now pulling through a line. The press accreditations are redistributed and only FOX News still has exclusive interviews with the president.
Since Trump has moved back into the White House, he chooses the reporters who may ask him questions Selectively, press accreditations are redistributed and only gets Fox News exclusive interviews with the president. But now the White House goes one step further by partially dismantling the White House Correspondents Association (WHCA). That is an independent association of journalists accredited at the White House, which was founded in 1914.
The WHCA determines which journalists are part of the correspondent pool. In the case of lack of space, for example at press conferences in the OVAL Office or in the Presidential Air Force One, the journalists of the correspondent pool went on the spot and reported to all accredited journalists according to a standardized procedure. They often work for The Associated Press, ABC News, CNN, Fox News, Reuters and The New York Times.
Free press undermined
“The WHCA dictated for a long time which journalists the president of the United States were allowed to ask questions in highest private situations, but not anymore,” said Karoline Leavitt, spokesperson for the White House. From now on the media team of the White House will determine that.
“This step undermines the independence of the free press in the United States,” says Eugene Daniels, reporter for polico and chairman of the association. “It suggests that the government will choose which journalists will beat the president. In a free country, leaders should not be able to choose their own press corps. “
The American newspaper The New York Times is talking about “attempting to undermine the public access from the public into independent, reliable information about the most powerful person in America”.