CNN, MS NOW and Politico Sue Trump Over White House Press Ban; TV Pool Halts Coverage

CNN, MS NOW and Politico filed a First Amendment lawsuit Monday, September 21, 2026, against President Trump and senior administration officials over his ban on the three outlets from White House grounds, arguing the ban amounts to unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination intended 'to coerce more favorable coverage of the administration from CNN, MS NOW, and POLITICO, and to deter other journalists and news organizations from reporting' unfavorable stories. The case was assigned to US District Judge Timothy Kelly, a 2017 Trump nominee who in November 2018 ordered the White House to restore then-CNN correspondent Jim Acosta's press pass in a similar first-term dispute. After the suit was filed, the White House television press pool — the rotating group of networks that shares video coverage of the president's events — said it would halt coverage of Trump's activities in New York and Washington in protest of CNN's exclusion, leaving several of his events without pool video as he began a week of diplomacy at the UN General Assembly.