It’s important to note that this was an informal press meeting. In other words, it wasn’t the usual formal press conference that Sean Spicer leads. It was what they call a press gaggle. Yes, like a gaggle of geese. It’s named for the collective honking sound reporters make when they’re shouting questions at the press secretary.
Nevertheless, a few outlets – CNN, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and Politico – weren’t included in the press gaggle. In addition, a few others boycotted the informal press meeting, including the Associated Press and Time.
As you would expect, this caused an eruption from the media, and it wasn’t limited to just those who weren’t included.
The executive editor of the New York Times stated:
Nothing like this has ever happened at the White House in our long history of covering multiple administrations of different parties. We strongly protest the exclusion of The New York Times and the other news organizations. Free media access to a transparent government is obviously of crucial national interest.
Jake Tapper said it was ‘unAmerican’:
CNN was blocked from WH @PressSec‘s media gaggle today. This is our response: pic.twitter.com/8SfY2uYKEI
— CNN Communications (@CNNPR) February 24, 2017
Even Fox News’s Bret Baier weighed in, showing solidarity with those excluded networks:
Some at CNN & NYT stood w/FOX News when the Obama admin attacked us & tried 2 exclude us-a WH gaggle should be open to all credentialed orgs https://t.co/8Vjcs0KCPR
— Bret Baier (@BretBaier) February 24, 2017
But Ari Fleischer – a veteran White House press secretary – said everyone should just calm down and stop hyperventilating:
Please. Pres O met w groups of hand selected columnists. Tell me WH staff didn’t have meetings w chosen reporters. Stop hyperventilating. https://t.co/y4bAHExbFT
— Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) February 24, 2017
I think it’s not wise for press sec 2bar outlets from gaggle. Job is to talk to all. But media should calm down. Aides do it all the time.
— Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) February 24, 2017
Joel Pollak of Breitbart explains that this uproar is actually fake news. Obama did the same thing. It’s just that there was no outrage then:
Obama’s private briefings for liberal members of the media, which excluded conservatives, were well-documented. A few:
- December 2012: Several journalists reported that MSNBC hosts were meeting privately with President Obama to discuss the impending “fiscal cliff” fight.
- May 2013: NPR’s Ari Shapiro reported that President Obama was meeting privately with “lefty columnists,” but hastened to add that there was “nothing nefarious” about it.
- November 2013: President Obama met again with liberal journalists, as Obamacare struggled with the failure of healthcare.gov and other problems.
- March 2015: Politico’s media reporter, Hadas Gold, reported that “a group of journalists and columnists,” all on the left, met privately with President Obama, but the White House refused to say “who else was at the meeting or what was discussed.”
The views expressed in this opinion article are solely those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by EagleRising.com
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