Major TV networks are resuming their pool coverage of President Donald Trump this week after uniting to suspend it following Trump’s move to ban multiple media outlets from the White House. But with uncertainty lingering over CNN’s access, two people familiar with the situation tell TIME that coverage will be decided on a day-by-day basis moving forward. The five networks that currently make up the White House TV pool—CNN, ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC—suspended their pool coverage of the President last week in a display of solidarity against the White House’s decision to bar CNN, along with POLITICO and MS NOW, from the grounds.
CBS resumed its normal, rotational pool duty, and CNN was granted access to complete a pool assignment at an event at the National Archives, the person familiar with the situation says. But, according to that individual, later on Friday, the White House contacted the pool and wanted to know if it would replace CNN for its scheduled pool duties on Saturday. The person says that the White House told the pool that it was going to make a day-by-day decision on the situation.
The White House ended up blocking CNN from traveling with the President on Air Force One on Saturday. The pool decided not to replace CNN with another TV network for its pool duties on Saturday, according to the person familiar with the situation. The networks individually decided whether to cover any events that were open press that day.
The person familiar with the situation says that the TV networks are continuing pool coverage this week, but the situation is fluid. Going forward, if the White House won’t grant CNN access when it’s CNN’s turn on pool duty, the TV pool will decide whether to replace CNN that day or not, depending on if the news that day merits it. The person says that there will likely be a high bar to meet to justify replacing CNN with another network on pool duty, if something is very newsworthy that day.
The White House press pool comprises journalists from multiple news organizations who accompany the sitting President to events. Space at these gatherings is often limited, so the pool system enables news organizations to collaborate and share resources. The five networks in the TV pool are tasked with recording video footage of the President at pool-designated events on a rotating basis.
It is rare for a sitting Commander-in-Chief to travel or hold events without the TV pool in attendance. The White House Correspondents’ Association, which acts as a “go-between” for journalists and the White House and helps ensure that journalists have access, has called pool duty “an essential element of the work of White House correspondents because one never knows when the world will need good information about precisely where the president of the United States is and what he is doing at any moment.” “The press is acting as a representative of the public in these spaces and they need access to these spaces because they can get information that they can’t get over the phone or watching a video feed or being outside of the grounds of the White House,” says Erin Carroll, a professor at Georgetown Law. For Trump to complain that stories are overly negative is unfair because, in one sense, that’s the press’s job—they’re there to check the three branches of government.” On Sept. 18, Trump announced that he was banning CNN, POLITICO, and MS NOW from the White House grounds.
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