White House Correspondents Insider

Behind the scenes of one of the most powerful clubs in America.

White House Continues to Boycott CNN

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Photo courtesy Gage Skidmore.

On Wednesday, the White House offered numerous news outlets an opportunity to interview Vice President Mike Pence. The primary topic was President Donald Trump’s Tuesday evening address to a joint session of Congress.

CNN was not invited to interview the Vice President.

Jake Tapper, anchor on the network, noted the network being passed over by the Trump administration. He quoted President Trump’s speech, saying the “[t]ime for trivial fights is behind us.”

According to the Vice President’s official schedule, Pence was interviewed by television networks ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, MSNBC, and radio hosts Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and Sean Hannity.

The administration has had a confrontational relationship with CNN, including President Trump calling the network “fake news,” the network being blocked from an “informal” Q&A session last Friday with press secretary Sean Spicer, and a situation last month wherein the Vice President skipped over the network while providing interviews to all other major Sunday morning news programs.

Vice President Pence will represent the White House alongside Chief of Staff Reince Priebus at the 2017 White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

Major Media Banned from Friday’s White House Q&A

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James Brady Press Briefing Room, 2007. Photo courtesy Wikipedia.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer’s Friday question-and-answer session will occur without major news outlets such as Politico, CNN, the New York Times, BuzzFeed and the Los Angeles Times.

Instead of the standard on-camera briefing in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, Spicer instead held an off-camera “gaggle” inside his West Wing office.  Attendees were welcomed to the session by invitation only.

Some major news organizations were also let in, such as ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, Reuters and Bloomberg.

Jeff Mason, the White House Correspondents’ Association president, blasted the situation.

“The WHCA board is protesting strongly against how today’s gaggle is being handled by the White House.  We encourage the organizations that were allowed in to share the material with others in the press corps who were not.  The board will be discussing this further with White House staff.”

The White House has not commented on the situation.

President Trump Asks April Ryan, a Veteran White House Correspondent Who Is African American, to Set Up Meeting with Congressional Black Caucus

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Kevin Liles, Amy Ryan, Hilary Rosen. Photo courtesy Haddad Media.

During yesterday’s Q&A with the media, President Donald J. Trump responded to a question from April Ryan, long-time White House correspondent and author of At Mama’s Knee: Mothers and Race in Black and White by asking her to arrange a meeting for him with the Congressional Black Caucus.

Late in a news conference that lasted over an hour, Ryan – who is African American – asked the president about a campaign pledge to revitalize American urban centers, often referred to by Trump as “inner-cities.”

The president’s response started with him stating that her question was “very professional and very good,” then followed up by Trump stating he received “a much higher percentage of the African American vote than a lot of people thought” due to his focus on this issue.

Ryan then followed up by asking the president if he was going to include the CBC” the Congressional Black Caucus, an organization of African-American Members of Congress, in discussions.

“I’ll tell you what, do you want to set up the meeting? Are they friends of yours?” the president responded.

“No,” Ryan replied, saying she was “just a reporter.”

Trump continued, saying “set up the meeting. Let’s go, set up a meeting. I would love to meet with the black caucus. I think it’s great. The Congressional Black Caucus.”

CBC spokeswoman Kamara Jones said the CBC sent the president a letter on January 19 inviting him to address the caucus, but has not yet received a response.  In a reply on Twitter, the CBC stated:

In a follow-up interview on CNN, Ryan said she would be happy to report on a meeting between the president and the CBC. “But as far as facilitating that meeting or convening that meeting, that is not my place. Every White House has someone to deal with this kind of meeting or this kind of bringing together of people. It’s up to that person in this White House to do that.”

Ryan has been the White House correspondent for American Urban Radio Networks since January 1997 and is also the author of best-selling My Up Close View of Three Presidents and Race in America.

President Trump Ignores Mainstream Media at White House Press Conferences

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Photo courtesy Wikipedia.

At the three most recent press conferences held by President Donald Trump, he has exclusively called on conservative-leaning firms and sites for questions.

On February 10, during a joint conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump called on the New York Post and Fox Business News.  Three days later when taking questions alongside Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Trump picked Sinclair-Broadcasting-owned WJLA and the Daily Caller to ask questions.  And on Wednesday when appearing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump chose the Christian Broadcasting News and Townhall.com.

Neither CBN nor Townhall.com asked President Trump about national security advisor Michael Flynn’s resignation or the slew of reports about contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence agents.

Mainstream media journalists have been locked out from directly asking Trump any questions at all.  CNN’s Jim Acosta voiced a question about Russia, which the president ignored.

Reporters have been blasting the president and Spicer both for avoiding difficult questions by cherry-picking only favorable, conservative sites.

Typically, past presidents have traditionally called on the Associated Press for the first question in a press conference, followed by major news organizations.

Spicer himself has taken questions from some mainstream outlets such as USA TODAY, ABC News and Reuters, although he has called on right-leaning media such as Breitbart, the Daily Mail and the Washington Times, far more frequently.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer Prefers Conservative News Outlets

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James Brady Press Briefing Room, 2007. Photo courtesy Wikipedia.

An analysis by the New York Times suggests that White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer has preferred questions from journalists representing non-traditional and center-right news outlets over mainstream journalists in his daily press briefings.

Historically, administrations have prioritized questions from journalists sitting in the first two rows of the briefing room, normally assigned to reporters representing mainstream media such as NPR, Associated Press, Fox News and Reuters. Spicer has avoided this tradition and has focused his attention more on “non-mainstream” journalists elsewhere in the briefing room.

In his first Q&A session on the job, Spicer granted the first question to a New York Post journalist who had written a book critical of the Clintons. His second question came from the conservative website LifeZette, founded by radio personality Laura Ingraham (who was also considered by Trump for the press secretary position). None of his first five questions in his first briefing were asked from the front two rows of mainstream outlets.  He regularly gives priority during briefings to journalists from conservative-leaning titles such as Breitbart, Newsmax and One America News Network.

In comparison, former Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’ first five questions in the initial 2009 Obama administration press briefing went to journalists representing mainstream outlets from the first two rows in the seating chart: Associated Press, CBS News, NBC News, ABC News and CNN.

Speaking with Sean Hannity in January, Spicer defended his decision:

“There are voices and issues that the mainstream media sometimes don’t capture, and it’s important for those issues to get as much prominence as some of the mainstream ones.”

The White House Correspondents’ Association – not the administration — has doled out seating assignments in the Press Room since 1981. Additional reporters with no seat assignment stand in the aisles of the room or sit in empty seats.

Vice President Pence Denounces Media for Lack of “Honeymoon” Period

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Photo courtesy Björn Hermansson / Pixabay.

Vice President Mike Pence blasted the news media on Wednesday for its coverage of the Trump administration, saying “if there was a honeymoon, it was pretty short.”

Blaming the media for a rocky start, Pence told conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh:

“I have to tell you that in all of my life, there was always a grace period. Right? New president’s coming in, I think they call it a honeymoon. Right? Where the media, like the others, gives the new administration a chance to come in and start to do what they do. And boy, if there was a honeymoon, it was pretty short. I sure don’t remember that.”

The vice president’s position that the media is taking an aggressive tone against the new administration is far more critical than that of President Trump, who has referred to CNN as “fake news” and has taken an aggressive stance against media stories critical of his actions.

Trump Administration Boycotts CNN

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Photo courtesy of Pixabay / Geralt.

CNN will no longer receive officials from the Trump Administration for on-air interviews and commentary, according to a report on Politico.

President Donald Trump has criticized CNN as “fake news” frequently since Election Day.

An anonymous White House official said “we’re sending surrogates to places where we think it makes sense to promote our agenda.” The official acknowledged the ban is not intended to be permanent.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer denied the administration was freezing out CNN, noting that he continues to take questions from the network’s journalists during regular daily briefings. He also defended the administration’s decision not to send spokespeople to the network for on-air coverage.

“I’m not going to sit around and engage with people who have no desire to actually get something right,” Spicer said at an event at George Washington University on Monday.

Former WH Press Secretaries Warn About Trump’s Press Relationship

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James Brady Press Briefing Room. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.

In a recent interview with Chuck Todd on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” several former White House press secretaries issued warnings and concerns about the incoming Trump White House and its relationship with the media.

“We’ve just elected a man who bullies female reporters at his rally as an applause line,” said Nicole Wallace, communications director under former President George W. Bush. “We have just elected a man who started a hot war with a female anchor instead of attending a debate she moderated. We are in a new place. And I don’t think it’s good. And I don’t think it has any parallels to the past.”

Bill Clinton’s press secretary, Joe Lockhart, warned over Trump’s tendency to ignore or simply make up facts. “It’s somewhat Orwellian, which, you know, you redefine the past, which means you can define the present and the future,” Lockhart said. “And that’s going to be very difficult for both sides to come to grips with.”

Ari Fleischer, who served as press secretary under Bush, addressed the mutual animosity between the press and Trump. Especially with public confidence in the press at historic lows, “the press has made itself vulnerable, because it lost the trust of their readers and their viewers — and Trump has widely taken advantage of it,” Fleischer concluded.

First Lady’s Legacy Transcends Race

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First Lady Michelle Obama announces the Best Picture Oscar to Argo live from the Diplomatic Room of the White House, Feb. 24, 2013. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza.

As the Obama transition out of the White House, we can start to gauge the impact of Michelle Obama on the office of First Lady and her role in American history.

From the outset, her status in history books was already assumed to be set: she would be the first African-American first lady.

But it is clear that her impact on society transcends and expands beyond just that single fact.

Entering the White House in 2009, Michelle made clear her first focus was on the Obama girls, Malia and Sasha, who were 10 and 7 at the time. Michelle’s initial travel and event schedule was quieter than prior first ladies, in order to allow her to spend more time with her daughters.

However, on a trip to London that year, Obama realized the influence and empowerment she could bestow through her position, especially with children and especially disadvantaged youth.

“If you want to know the reason why I’m standing here, it’s because of education. I loved getting A’s. I liked being smart. I loved being on time. I loved getting my work done. I thought being smart was cooler than anything in the world,” she said on that trip. This message would be the backbone of her message as First Lady throughout her time in the White House.

Obama started to “turn the needle” to spend time and effort with projects such as childhood obesity, education, veterans and military families, healthy eating, the Let’s Move! Initiative, and even creating a White House garden.

At the dedication of the garden, Obama said:

“This garden has taught us that if we have the courage to plant a seed, just be brave enough to plant it, then take care of it, water it, tend to it, invite friends to help us take care of it, weather the storms that inevitably come, if we have the courage to do that, we never know what might grow. Now that’s what this garden has taught me, to be fearless in those efforts, to try some new things, to not be afraid to mess up. Things we tell our kids all the time.”

Even when she becomes former first lady, Michelle Obama has cemented that message in the lives of millions of Americans and people across the globe.