Having already seized power from the White House Correspondents’ Association regarding press pool assignments, the Trump administration’s press shop is now reportedly looking to take charge of reporters' seating chart in the White House briefing room.
“The White House should abandon this wrong-headed effort and show the American people they’re not afraid to explain their policies and field questions from an independent media free from government control,” the WHCA board reacted in a fiery statement on Monday.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Over the weekend, Axios reported that the White House was planning to impose its own seating arrangement for journalists in the briefing room, a task that had long been handled by reporters who are part of the WHCA.
This comes just a month after the administration stripped the association of the responsibility of assigning which outlets participate in the pooled events that cover the president at places such as the Oval Office and Air Force One. When the White House took over that function, which the WHCA had controlled for decades, the association strenuously objected. “In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps,” WHCA president Eugene Daniels said at the time.
On top of that, the Associated Press — which has long held a prominent spot in the briefing room and pool rotation — is currently fighting the administration in court to restore its access to the pooled events. The AP was banned by the White House over the outlet's refusal to label the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” following President Donald Trump’s executive order. The WHCA’s support of the AP in its legal fight prompted the administration to take over the pool assignments.
Amid the ongoing tensions between the association and the White House, which has made hostility to the mainstream press a hallmark, a senior administration official told Axios’ Mike Allen — who was recently featured in the briefing room’s “new media” seat — that plans have been set to fundamentally restructure the seating chart “based on metrics more reflective of how media is consumed today.”
“The goal isn’t merely favorable coverage,” the official told Axios. “It’s truly an honest look at consumption [of the outlets’ coverage]. Influencers are important but it’s tough because they aren’t [equipped to provide] consistent coverage. So the ability to cover the White House is part of the metrics.”
While the official added that major legacy outlets would still be included, their visibility would diminish compared with the spots they customarily received in the past. “We want to balance disruption with responsibility,” the official said.
In its statement on Monday, the WHCA board said that if the White House moves forward with this plan, “it will become even more clear that the administration is seeking to cynically seize control of the system through which the independent press organizes itself, so that it is easier to exact punishment on outlets over their coverage.”
Invoking the White House’s fight with the AP, the board also stated that the administration was showing why they wanted to seize even more power over how the press corps covers it.
“The reason the White House wants control of the briefing room is the same reason they took control of the pool: to exert pressure on journalists over coverage they disagree with. This was explicit with The Associated Press, where the president and his staff plainly said their removal from covering presidential events was punishment for their style guide. And their motives here are explicit again,” the statement noted.
“The administration has sought to obscure that fact by suggesting that they are ushering in new media outlets that are somehow excluded from the WHCA,” the board continued.
The board also pushed back on another claim made by the official to Axios — that the WHCA had floated the idea of making the sitting White House press secretary — currently Karoline Leavitt — the association’s president.
“We’ll also add the notion of having the White House press secretary preside over an independent organization of journalists who are negotiating access with the administration is ridiculous,” the board asserted. “No board member or official representative of the WHCA has ever put forward such a non-starter suggestion.”
The WHCA board ended its letter by stating that the White House “picked this fight and continues to do so,” adding that the association’s members “want to cover the administration without fear or favor, and stand ready to question government officials from any corner of the Brady Briefing Room.”
“There is a reason Democratic and Republican administrations alike have maintained the existing arrangement with WHCA for decades. But if a White House’s goal instead is to receive ‘favorable coverage’ through easy questions, the American people lose out,” the letter concluded.
While the WHCA is pushing back against the White House on the seating chart, the organization has already backed down to the administration’s complaints over a featured performer at this year’s White House Correspondent’s Dinner.
After White House Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich railed against comments Amber Ruffin made in a podcast, calling her a “garbage, hate-filled comedian” and wondering what kind of “sensible journalist would attend something like this,” Daniels sent out a letter this weekend announcing there would be no headliner at the event.
“I wanted to share that the WHCA board has unanimously decided we are no longer featuring a comedic performance this year,” he wrote in his letter to WHCA members. “At this consequential moment for journalism, I want to ensure the focus is not on the politics of division but entirely on awarding our colleagues for their outstanding work and providing scholarship and mentorship to the next generation of journalists.”
