Major networks pause White House pool coverage as press battle ignites
President Donald Trump said he is banning three major outlets from White House coverage. Now, other networks are suspending White House pool coverage, and a lawsuit is on the way.
by Summer Lane | September 21, 2026
Following President Trump’s surprising Friday announcement that he would ban three major news outlets from covering the Oval Office, five major networks have joined forces to protest the president’s actions.
Five major networks – ABC, CNN, Fox News, CBS, and NBC – will abstain from providing White House pool coverage this week, according to several reports.
This comes after President Trump banned CNN, Politico, and MS NOW from covering the White House, igniting a standoff between his administration and what the president calls the “Fake News” media.
“The White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish,” the president posted on social media on Monday, explaining his decision. “It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like Cancer in our beloved United States of America.”
The “pool” in this case refers to the press corps that travels with President Trump and provides daily coverage of the administration.
According to CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins, Fox News Washington Bureau Chief Bryan Boughton wrote an email advising that there would be no TV pool covering presidential events on Monday. “This follows the White House’s position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties,” he wrote in an alleged off-the-record email. “There will be no replacement pool put in place.”
A media-related email from the White House on Sunday night did not show the major TV pool networks, but listed Hearst as its secondary TV crew in D.C., and Real America’s Voice as its secondary TV crew for its out-of-town crew (the president is traveling to New York on Monday for the United Nations General Assembly).
On Monday, the three outlets barred from the White House by Trump (Politico, MS NOW, and CNN) said in a joint statement that they would file a federal lawsuit to “protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes.”
The three outlets said that their journalists’ credentials were revoked “without notice or process” and alleged that such actions “threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”
Vice President J.D. Vance, when asked about the White House’s move to ban the networks, said that it wasn’t “banning.”
“What he’s doing is saying we’re not gonna give you special access to the White House if you engage in what is effectively propaganda,” he said of President Trump’s decision.
Photo: Adobe Stock
