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The Trump administration moved quickly to shake up the pool of journalists who cover the White House by adding Newsmax, a right-leaning outlet, to the rotation on Wednesday and booting out a reporter from HuffPost, a left-leaning outlet, and Reuters wire service.
HuffPost White House reporter S.V. Date was scheduled for the Wednesday pool rotation but was told late Tuesday evening there was “no room” for him. Axios, a new media addition, is instead serving as the print reporter on Wednesday.
The White House did not respond to the Washington Examiner’s request for comment.
Normally, three wire services cover the president as part of a rotating group of 18 radio, television, print, and wire service reporters.
But after press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced on Tuesday that the White House would take control of assignment duties from the White House Correspondents’ Association, only one wire service is covering President Donald Trump on Wednesday: Bloomberg.
The White House will select the other two slots as it sees fit in a move that breaks with decades of tradition.
“It is essential in a democracy for the public to have access to news about their government from an independent, free press,” the Associated Press, Bloomberg, and Reuters said in a joint statement on Wednesday. “We believe that any steps by the government to limit the number of wire services with access to the President threatens that principle. It also harms the spread of reliable information to people, communities, businesses and global financial markets that heavily depend on our reporting.”
The administration added Newsmax as a secondary television correspondent pool, joining ABC News on Wednesday.
The Blaze, another right-leaning outlet, is now the New Media pool, which allows newer or untraditional outlets and influencers to cover Trump.
“We want more outlets and new outlets to have a chance to take part in the press pool to cover this administration’s unprecedented achievements up close, front and center,” Leavitt said at Tuesday’s press briefing.
Eugene Daniels, president of the WHCA, slammed the move in a statement, noting that the White House had not told the organization about the changes.
“This move tears at the independence of a free press in the United States. It suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president,” Daniels said. “In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps.”
The Associated Press, one of the original three wire services that regularly covers the president, sued three members of the administration, including Leavitt, after reporters were barred from covering Oval Office events and accompanying him on Air Force One.
Associated Press reporters faced this exclusion because the Trump administration took offense at the wire service’s refusal to comply with the president’s executive order renaming the “Gulf of Mexico” to the “Gulf of America.”
The organization faced a legal setback after a federal judge refused to reinstitute Associated Press reporters immediately. The lawsuit will continue on March 20, when the next hearing is scheduled.
Some legacy media reporters, including NPR, are still part of the pool team covering Trump on Wednesday.
However, several reporters have denounced the administration’s unprecedented move to take control of pool assignments.
“HuffPost condemns this egregious violation of the First Amendment. Americans deserve fair and honest reporting on their president,” HuffPost Editor-in-Chief Whitney Snyder said about the ouster. “The White House must stop this cowardly behavior and restore HuffPost’s place in the press pool immediately.”
“The press corps (from across a broad spectrum of TV, radio, print, stills, wires, and new media) that cover the White House full time,” said Jacqui Heinrich, a White House correspondent for Fox News and a WHCA board member. “This is a short-sighted decision, and it will feel a lot different when a future Democratic administration kicks out conservative-leaning outlets and other critical voices.”
“This move does not give the power back to the people — it gives power to the White House. The WHCA is democratically elected by the full-time White House press corps,” she wrote in a separate post.
After Peter Baker, a New York Times reporter, criticized the Trump administration, Leavitt hit back on X.
“Your hysterical reaction to our long overdue and much needed change to an outdated organization is precisely why we made it,” she wrote. “Gone are the days where left-wing stenographers posing as journalists, such as yourself, dictate who gets to ask what.”
“Guess he won’t be a pooler anytime soon,” Katie Miller, an aide in Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, replied to Leavitt.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration removed the New York Times, NPR, NBC News, and Politico from their office spaces covering the Pentagon to make way for the New York Post, One America News Network, Breitbart News Network, and HuffPost.
A week later, CNN, the Washington Post, the Hill, and War Zone were kicked out of their office spaces covering the Pentagon to make space for Newsmax, the Washington Examiner, the Daily Caller, and the Free Press. The Washington Examiner already had a designated workspace and did not seek a second desk prior to the announcement.
These outlets, except for the HuffPost, all have conservative editorial stances.
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ANNOUNCES TAKEOVER OF PRESS ROTATIONS FOR WHITE HOUSE EVENTS
The moves represent a new shift as the Trump administration seeks greater control of the media and aims to dominate public attention through executive action.
“As I have said since the first day behind this podium, it’s beyond time that the White House press operation reflects the media habits of the American people in 2025, not 1925,” Leavitt said. “A select group of D.C.-based journalists should no longer have a monopoly over the privilege of press access at the White House. All journalists, outlets, and voices deserve a seat at this highly coveted table.”