On Friday evening, White House communications director Stephen Chung and press secretary Caroline Leavitt sent out a memo announcing new restrictions on press access to the West Wing. According to the memo, members of the White House press corps will now have limited access without an appointment to an area known as the “top press.”
The move comes amid extensive changes to the Washington press corps under President Trump. In the White House, the Trump administration took unprecedented steps by selecting partisan, right-wing organizations to fill the seats in the briefing room for daily press conferences and join the pool of reporters who accompany the president at events. These tasks have long been the preserve of the White House Correspondents' Association. Some reporters outside the carefully selected party element were subject to insults from senior White House officials.
The changes echo others at the Pentagon, where recent restrictions on the press have been even more dramatic. The reporters were there asked to sign a pledge promising not to collect information that has not been authorized to be disclosed. The move prompted several news organizations, including prominent conservative news outlets, to release the object. They were promptly replaced by a host of carefully selected media figures, including conspiracy theorists And extremists.
One White House correspondent who spoke with TPM on Friday said the new restrictions on the top press are a sign of worse to come in the West Wing.
“They've already kicked every legitimate news organization out of the Pentagon. Now they want to do the same here,” said the correspondent, who asked to remain anonymous to provide a candid assessment.
Traditionally, White House press pass holders have been able to have relatively free access to several parts of the complex, including the press workstations adjacent to the briefing room, the briefing room itself and the North Lawn, where TV networks film stand-up specials and reporters often ask questions of officials as they enter the building. In addition to these areas, reporters with hard passes can enter the area behind the briefing room podium, known as the “lower press”, as well as the “upper press” area, which is located on the floor above. While the lower press contains the offices of the relatively junior press assistants, the upper press contains the offices of the press secretary and the director of public relations. Reporters hound the top press when they want to talk to these more senior aides.
To gain access to the upper press, you must go through a Secret Service security checkpoint where your hard pass must be displayed. Often after important events, reporters walk into the hallway outside the press secretary's office to get comment. Other officials, including members of the Cabinet and, very rarely, the President, sometimes pass through the senior press and speak with reporters there.
Cheng and Leavitt's memo attributed the new restrictions to “recent structural changes at the National Security Council.”
“The White House is now responsible for managing all communications, including on all national security matters,” the memo states. “In this capacity, members of the White House communications staff regularly handle sensitive materials.”
The memo said the new restrictions “will ensure compliance with best practices regarding access to sensitive materials.” It also notes that reporters “will continue to interact freely with White House press secretaries in the lower press area outside the briefing room.”
Chung did not respond to an email from TPM asking whether the specific national security disclosure issue related to the top press had ever arisen. He also did not answer questions about insults, humiliation and growing partisanship in the White House press office.
