JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
President Trump says he is banning three news outlets from the White House. They are CNN, Politico and MS NOW, which used to be MSNBC. A reporter for Bloomberg News asked Trump about it at a press conference this afternoon.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are you trying to intimidate the press from doing their job?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, no, no, no. I dislike dishonest press, like you. I think you're terrible.
SUMMERS: Now, this latest threat is an escalation of a long-running war Trump has waged on the media. It's a war that's already seen press access to the White House, the Pentagon, as well as official events scaled back. NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik is with us now. Hi there.
DAVID FOLKENFLIK, BYLINE: Hey, Juana.
SUMMERS: David, tell us how we got here. What led Trump to threaten to ban CNN, MS NOW and Politico?
FOLKENFLIK: Well, it's a fair question. I mean, we first learned about it when he posted on Truth Social that he was saying, effective immediately, he was going to ban them. He went on a little bit of a tirade and said, media outlets shouldn't be able to constantly write or report fiction and lies when they're covering the president of the United States. And then he also addressed it a little bit more. We heard a moment in your intro from him. But here's another moment where he was saying why he took this action in a back-and-forth with reporters at the White House this afternoon.
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TRUMP: They purposely write negative news, and they do that because they want to try and diminish the Republicans and a Republican administration.
FOLKENFLIK: He also said that it was, you know, sort of a frustration that had built up over the last two years, as opposed to any specific story, but it's worth noting what stories are in the news lately. You know, there's an unpopular war going on in the Middle East, initiated by the president. There are elections coming up in which a lot of candidates who have embraced him strongly appear to be dragged down by him in the polls. There are - question of the economy and how that's going.
And of course, there are all these headlines about his efforts to essentially take over and commandeer the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, perhaps demolish it if he doesn't get his name on it. So there's a lot of news he doesn't like right now. Hard to pick one.
SUMMERS: OK, David, have we heard anything from the three news outlets that the president is targeting here? Have they responded?
FOLKENFLIK: So I have actually spoken to two out of the three, haven't yet reached Politico. But CNN put out a statement today saying that they would stand by their White House team, their fair and accurate reporting. They say there's a right under the Constitution to do that reporting without hindrance or interference from the government. And they said it would be a, quote, "illegal assault on that fundamental constitutionally protected right" should the ban that President Trump announced go ahead.
I also spoke to Theodore Boutrous. He's one of the leading First Amendment lawyers in the country. He told me it was clearly, on its face, unconstitutional and that he has been hired by CNN already. It's worth noting, of course, this hasn't taken effect yet. CNN and MS NOW and presumably Politico's reporters are still in place. MS NOW declined to comment because they - I think it sounds to me as though they're hanging back and waiting to see how this plays out.
SUMMERS: Yeah. Now, here's the question - can the president even actually do this? Is this legal?
FOLKENFLIK: Well, on its face, you'd think not - not only not legal, but not constitutional, as CNN asserts. And that's because the president is blaring to the world that he's doing it because he doesn't like the coverage from these networks. And I'll tell you - or on these outlets - you know, there's something called viewpoint discrimination. The federal government is not allowed to discriminate against people or news outlets because it doesn't like how they express themselves or what coverage they offer.
Now, the press has won some rounds on this. NPR won a round on this against the president over an executive order. CNN, the New York Times - over the efforts to push out reporters from the Pentagon on similar grounds. And CNN itself won in the - Trump's first term with former reporter Jim Acosta. But the details matter here. And as the president himself said to reporters today, it kind of depends on what judge you get if this goes to court.
SUMMERS: OK, so even given all of that though, just, like, in a practical sense here, hasn't Trump been fairly successful in restricting press access despite those victories?
FOLKENFLIK: I think the president has had some success in doing that, but what he's been able to do is to roar at the press. Yes, there has been limitations put on coverage at the Defense department, but the press is fighting back and may win some of that back. What he's trying to do is ward off more aggressive accountability journalism. I think you've seen a lot of journalism even when the president has been trying to intimidate journalists. And what he's doing is - on its face would appear to be, I want to say once more, not only illegal but unconstitutional.
SUMMERS: NPR's David Folkenflik, thanks.
FOLKENFLIK: You bet. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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