“Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called press coverage of the Iran war ‘a national betrayal,’ and described journalists as anti-American traitors for reporting on the actions of the Pentagon,” Bloomberg reports.
Said Hegseth: “A free press is of course important, but partisan activism that intentionally smears the troops and the historic mission that they are undertaking is fundamentally anti-American. It’s sick. It’s a national betrayal. It’s treason.”
“The chairman of the FCC on Wednesday dismissed concerns about the White House use of taxpayer money to pay for a series of ads promoting President Donald Trump,” Deadline reports.
Said FCC Chairman Brendan Carr: “I don’t think there’s anything unique or different about it, other than being a normal PSA, the types of PSAs that the government naturally and normally runs.”
“New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani stopped by ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ on Monday and addressed his friendly relationship with President Trump, prompting Kimmel to ask for advice on how to get on the president’s good side,” The Wrap reports.
Said Mamdani: “Sorry, brother. Look, the president and I have many disagreements. One thing we do agree on is this city, how much we love this city. So, from that first meeting in November of last year, I was just thinking of, ‘How can we make this meeting not about us but about New Yorkers? How can we spend that time talking about the things that could make life in this city that little bit easier?’ And that’s what it’s been.”
“Three news organizations that President Trump abruptly banished from White House grounds this month asked a federal court to block the ban until the case against it is resolved, saying the administration has ‘persisted in unpredictably and inconsistently implementing its ban’ despite a judge’s restraining order – including selectively barring CNN from White House pool duties,” CBS News reports.
“David Ellison had a seat at Donald Trump’s table Thursday night. The journalists at the news organization he is about to own were fighting for access to the same White House,” The Wrap reports.
“It was a striking split screen at the end of an extraordinary week for CNN.”
“Hours before Ellison arrived for a state dinner honoring Chinese President Xi Jinping, CNN was still battling the Trump administration over its ability to cover the president.”
Daniel Dale: “His relentless dishonesty has become a central feature of U.S. and world politics. Voters and members of Congress, allies and adversaries, CEOs and investors alike have had to try to figure out how to read a man whose words are so frequently not true.”
“The major networks are set to resume their collective television coverage of President Trump on Sunday, even though the White House blocked CNN from participating in the TV pool over the weekend,” the New York Times reports.
“Throughout the past week, the quintet had suspended the TV pool in an effort to force the administration to reinstate CNN, after Mr. Trump barred its journalists from the White House grounds. The networks went so far as to refuse to air footage of portions of Mr. Trump’s summit with China’s top leader, Xi Jinping.”
“But under a tentative plan that began taking shape late Friday, the other four networks would return to performing pool duties… Each time that CNN comes up in the pool rotation, the group of networks will decide whether to provide a substitute crew.”
“President Trump again raged at his press coverage Saturday morning, calling on the courts to enforce bans of particular outlets from the White House,” The Wrap reports.
Said Trump: “Why should perpetrators of FAKE NEWS, like CNN and MSDNC, be allowed access to a very sacred place, the White House? Despite my big Election Win, almost 100% of ‘TRUMP’ coverage is negative, and has been for years!”
New York Times: “Since his earliest candidate days, when chants of ‘CNN sucks!’ rang out at rallies, Mr. Trump has used the media as a reliable punching bag. And in his second term, he has drastically escalated his attacks, drawing on the levers of government — issuing subpoenas, seizing devices and using regulatory pressure — to intimidate outlets that displease him. Mr. Trump has also sought to bar The Associated Press from parts of the White House and started handpicking which journalists can attend certain events.”
“His abrupt White House ban was another novel effort to micromanage his coverage. And with Republicans worrying about a bleak midterm outlook, Mr. Trump’s allies seized the moment to rehash the usual complaints about a corrupt liberal media — perhaps a soothing topic for a president whose poll numbers have dipped.”
“But Mr. Trump, inadvertently or not, had also threatened something he deems precious: his own television coverage.”
“CNN said it was pulled from a planned trip with President Trump for Saturday, the second time in less than a week that the news network was barred from a scheduled rotation in the TV press pool,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Deadline: White House again blocks CNN from covering Trump on Air Force One as TV pool network.
“President Donald Trump spent months plotting ways to impress Xi Jinping,” CNN reports.
“But even after enlisting two military bands, ordering up a flyover, speeding construction of his new helipad and rolling out a literal red carpet, Trump ended up directly undercutting what the Chinese leader craved most: Network television cameras.”
“Trump’s abrupt ban on three news outlets — including CNN — disrupted months of careful planning for Xi’s state visit, frustrating both U.S. and Chinese officials over the limited coverage of a summit meant to showcase the two men together in front of a global audience.”
Quinta Jurecic: “Trump’s standoff with the press reflects the fury of a man who has grasped, however dimly, that he cannot control everything…”
“It is also the fury of someone insistent on exerting as much power as he can over the steadily shrinking universe of what does remain directly under his control. If Republicans lose unified control of Congress in the midterms, then Trump’s old allies will be less likely to swear fealty, and that universe will diminish even further.”
“There is a danger to democracy here, but it is less the danger of a strategic shift toward authoritarianism and more the danger of petulance and stupidity. Every president struggles with irrelevance in the waning years of their power, and Trump has never been one to decline gracefully.”
Washington Sun: “Duly elected members of Congress are constitutionally required to be human, and all humans are biologically required to pee. On voting days, a member who chooses to do so in the nearest suitable facility puts themselves in the path of the horde of people who desperately want information from them.”
“Aside from the Republican cloakroom — which provides lawmakers with cheap hot dogs and grilled cheeses — the members-only bathrooms off the House floor, adjacent to the lavish Speaker’s Lobby, are some of the only places near the floor where lawmakers are out of view from the Hill’s many nosy reporters.”
“The U.S. network video pool for the White House was back in operation Friday, for the first time since President Donald Trump banned three news outlets in a high-profile showdown over media access,” the Washington Sun reports.
MS NOW: White House allows CNN back into TV pool after blocking some journalists hours earlier.
“Pope Leo XIV told reporters they were welcome to cover him, as he responded to the Trump administration’s attempt to bar U.S. media from the White House and affirmed the importance of journalists covering public figures,” the Associated Press reports.
“President Trump blasted CNN and MS Now on Thursday over their coverage of his meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, which did not include live video coverage and came as a federal judge reinstated the outlets’ White House access,” NewsNation reports.
Said Trump: “The event was magnificent — Actually made for Television but, because they’re Fake News, and because they knew how good it would be, they didn’t want credit to be given to ‘TRUMP,’ they refused to be there.”
Deadline: CNN says it was denied Trump White House access to cover arrivals at state dinner for Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Tucker Carlson told NPR that Donald Trump should be removed from office under the 25th amendment, suggesting the president was not actually in charge when he ordered the start of the Iran war.
Said Carlson: “I don’t think he had the latitude to make this decision on his own.”
“CNN and MS NOW were denied entry to cover a state dinner at the White House Thursday night despite a federal judge ordering that their access be restored,” The Wrap reports.
“President Donald Trump hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping at a state dinner at the White House on Thursday night. When reporters from the outlets attempted to cover arrivals at the event, officials from the Trump administration told them they were not allowed to do so.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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