White House Correspondents’ Association condemns White House’s move to exclude newspaper as ‘deeply troubling’.

United States President Donald Trump’s administration has barred The Wall Street Journal from accompanying the president on an upcoming overseas trip amid a spat over the newspaper’s coverage of his links to the notorious financier Jeffrey Epstein.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Monday that the Journal would not be among 13 media outlets travelling with Trump on a visit to Scotland this weekend due to its “fake and defamatory conduct”.

“Every news organization in the entire world wishes to cover President Trump, and the White House has taken significant steps to include as many voices as possible,” Leavitt said in a statement.

The move comes after the Journal last week reported that Trump sent Epstein, who died in jail in 2009 while facing sex trafficking charges, a “bawdy” letter in 2003 to mark the occasion of his 50th birthday.

Trump, who has vigorously denied the report, on Friday filed a defamation lawsuit against the newspaper and its owners seeking $20bn in damages.

In a statement, the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) called the Trump administration’s move “deeply troubling”.

“Government retaliation against news outlets based on the content of their reporting should concern all who value free speech and an independent media,” WCHA president Weijia Jiang said.

“We strongly urge the White House to restore the Wall Street Journal to its previous position in the pool and aboard Air Force One for the President’s upcoming trip to Scotland. The WCHA stands ready to work with the administration to find a quick resolution.”

The Trump administration has taken similar action to limit the access of media outlets over their coverage before.

In February, the White House began excluding the Associated Press from news events over its decision to keep using the “Gulf of Mexico” in some cases, despite Trump issuing an executive order to rename the waterway the “Gulf of America”.

Trump has been under pressure to release more information about the government’s investigations into Epstein, particularly from segments of his “Make America Great Again” base, which had expected his administration to confirm their belief in a conspiracy implicating powerful elites in sex crimes against children.

Many MAGA supporters have expressed outrage over the Trump administration’s handling of the so-called “Epstein files” since the release of a law enforcement memo that concluded the well-connected financier died by suicide and there was no credible evidence of him blackmailing powerful figures.

Trump, whom Epstein once described as his “closest friend”, has acknowledged knowing Epstein, but said in 2019 that they had not spoken in 15 years after a “falling out” between the pair.

Source:

Al Jazeera and news agencies