It is now official: the Trump administration will no longer send representatives to be interviewed by CNN. The worldwide news network that provides itself on being the most universally watched news on the planet is now going to have to make due without Trump surrogates gracing the air waves for interviews.
The administration said the ban is not permanent. But, it is virtually unprecedented. Perhaps the closest we have seen to such turbulence between the White House and a news network might be the jabs Obama took at FOX News. But, no news organization has been outright cut off from personal interviews with White House officials as punishment for its poor journalism.
It is the kind of thing we never thought we would hear: the White House just black-balled CNN – it will no longer send surrogates to the network for interviews.
Over the weekend, “State of the Union” anchor Jake Tapper said on his show and via Twitter that the White House had declined his invitations to appear. Perhaps it had begun to dawn on Tapper – apparently CNN was the last to know.
No officials from the Trump White House had appeared on CNN since Tapper’s “State of the Union” that aired on January 8, when Kellyanne Conway was interviewed. She had also appeared on CNN the following Wednesday with Anderson Cooper. On that day, the now famous clash took place between Trump and CNN correspondent, Jim Acosta, who shouted out to Trump to answer his question since Trump was attacking his news organization.
Previously, Trump had issued an attack at the news conference in which he lambasted CNN for reporting that intelligence officials had briefed both Trump and then-President Barack Obama that the Russians supposedly had in their possession a dossier full of blistering, negative information about Trump.
CNN had reported that the US intelligence agencies had reportedly given Barack Obama and Donald Trump information on the suspicion that certain “Russian agents” would have compromising material about the new president. The online portal BuzzFeed had published an anonymous dossier on this topic.
Donald Trump is well-known for his difficult relationship with the American mass media, most of whom he excoriates on a regular basis for their lack of professionalism. Among the leading media Trump criticized not only CNN, but also The New York Times and The Washington Post. However, Trump has emblazoned the brand CNN on the American imagination forever as standing for Clinton News Network.
At the news conference on January 8, the president-elect refused to take a question from Acosta and chided CNN for being “fake news.”
Since then, Conway, press secretary Spicer, chief of staff Reince Priebus, and Vice President Mike Pence have each been making the obligatory rounds on the major Sunday shows – with one exception, CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Supposedly, an official from the Trump administration, speaking anonymously, said: “We send collaborators to places where we think it makes sense to promote our program,” while acknowledging that CNN is not going to be one of those places anytime soon. According to the unnamed spokesperson, however, the “ban” is not permanent.
On Monday, Sean Spicer, the White House spokesman, rejected the accusations, saying he continues to answer CNN’s questions at press conferences. He then denounced CNN’s posture: “I will not sit down and engage with people who have no desire to actually get something right.”
On the other hand, unnamed sources from CNN are not so happy. One CNN correspondent said the White House was trying to “punish the television channel and reduce its audience share.” Ironically, it would be difficult to reduce CNN’s market share since it already has among the lowest ratings.
From the standpoint of the CNN reporter, “They’re trying to cull CNN from the herd.” That must be sophisto talk for getting spanked.
Trump officials continue to answer questions from CNN during the daily press briefings. But, the bottom line of this tiff is that people like press secretary Sean Spicer and US Presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway have not, are not, and will not be appearing on the station’s broadcasts for some time.
To add insult to injury, on the eve of Donald Trump’s inauguration on 19 January, CNN had also broadcast a controversial report on a catastrophic scenario involving the assassination of the new U.S. president at the same ceremony.
The White House is effectively denying CNN entrée to an arena in which officials will often drop hints at upcoming events, and deliver quotable quotes for the press about the current state of affairs. This is the real sting for CNN, they have lost a certain kind of privileged access to getting White House information straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.
The White House’s position is that it is choosing to send representatives to places where it thinks it would make sense to present the Trump action program – and CNN is not such a facility.
Spicer is quickly mastering the art of double-speak. When first questioned about the new policy, he had stressed that he would continue to take questions from the CNN representative at the daily briefings. However, he then added that he would “not sit with people and talk, which did not wish to understand anything.” In other words, Spicer is not cutting anyone off from White House access who works with CNN … and he is also not giving interviews at CNN for their shows.
