The Justice Department has launched an investigation into whether the five major networks violated antitrust laws when they suspended participation in the White House TV pool in protest of Donald Trump‘s ban on CNN.
Emily Covington, a spokesperson for the Justice Department, said in a statement, “Members of the television press pool have boycotted covering White House events. Group boycotts among commercial competitors can violate the Sherman Act. The Antitrust Division is simply investigating to determine whether these news organizations have violated the antitrust laws.” The New York Times first reported on the investigation.
After Trump announced his ban on CNN, Politico and MS NOW from the White House grounds on Sept. 18, CNN also was restricted from the TV pool. As part of a long-running arrangement, CNN, CBS News, ABC News, NBC News and Fox News rotate pool duty providing technical, video and reporting coverage of the president, with feeds then distributed to other networks and news organizations. The pool is necessary because of the space limitations of areas of the White House, like the Oval Office, or on Air Force One.
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After the CNN freeze out, the other members of the TV pool jointly announced on Sept. 21 that they would refrain from their rotation turn, a move made to protest the White House effort to block the news network.
“The public has a vital interest in receiving accurate, independent information about its government. No administration should restrict a news organization because it objects to its reporting,” the five networks said in a statement at the time.
The suspension lasted for about four days, but it came during the White House visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping. The suspension of the TV pool meant that there was much less video coverage of major ceremonies and other events surrounding his visit. Trump later complained that CNN and MS NOW did not cover Xi’s visit, without mentioning his efforts to ban the two outlets from the White House grounds.
ABC confirmed that it has not received any notification of the investigation but it expects to. A CNN spokesperson declined to comment. Other networks in the pool did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The White House has continued to restrict CNN from certain assignments, including flying on Air Force One on presidential trip.
After Trump’s ban on CNN, Politico and MS NOW from White House grounds, those three media outlets sued, claiming violations of their First Amendment and due process rights. A federal judge imposed a temporary restraining order, which last until Tuesday, that has forced the White House to renew access to dozens of reporters. The judge, Timothy Kelly, is expected to rule by then on whether to grant the news outlets a preliminary injunction, something that would prevent the White House from denying access on a longer term.
The issue of access to the White House grounds is separate, yet related, to the issue of whether the administration can also freeze out members of the pool because the president does not approve of their editorial decisions. A different case, involving the Associated Press, is on appeal in the D.C. Circuit. The AP was barred from the White House pool because its style guidance did not adhere to Trump’s renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
The investigation has the potential to set up another legal battle against the Trump administration over the First Amendment.
Bruce Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press, said in a statement that the investigation “appears to be a pretext for seeking records from the networks about how they are covering daily White House events during a media ban the president himself put in place. The decisions news organizations make about coverage are protected by the First Amendment, and summoning antitrust authority, on top of the retaliatory actions the White House has already taken to bar certain outlets, is another and even more brazen attempt to try to intimidate journalists.”
The administration has been rebuffed in the federal courts in another effort to seek materials from media organizations as part of an antitrust investigation. Last year, a federal judge barred the Federal Trade Commission from issuing a civil investigative demand to Media Matters for America, the progressive watchdog group, as part of an antitrust investigation of an advertiser boycott of Elon Musk’s X.
Media Matters later said that a settlement with the FTC required that the agency forgo issuing such a civil investigation demand. They also said that the “agreement — and the decisions Media Matters won in the district court and the court of appeals — offers a roadmap for other newsgathering and nonprofit organizations facing, or at risk of, government retaliation.” Three advertising holding companies, WPP, Dentsu and Publicis, also reached a settlement with the FTC.
A legal battle also would be a test for David Ellison, the CEO of Skydance, which completed its merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. this past week. The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division gave the greenlight to the transaction in June. Vowing to protect editorial independence, Ellison said at a town hall that he backed CNN’s lawsuit over the ban on White House access.
