AP accuses Trump White House of defying court order restoring access

The Associated Press accused aides to President Donald Trump of defying a court order restoring its access to press events in the White House after a judge found the news agency had faced unlawful retaliation.

In a court filing on Wednesday, lawyers for the AP accused the White House of continuing to exclude its journalists from the small pool of reporters that travels with the president and attends events in the Oval Office in violation of U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden's order lifting those restrictions while a lawsuit moves forward.

McFadden found the White House had discriminated against the AP for continuing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its coverage rather than the Gulf of America as ordered by Trump. The court said the White House had likely violated free speech protections under the U.S. Constitution.

The White House has appealed McFadden’s ruling to a federal appeals court, which is set to hear arguments on Thursday over whether to pause the decision.

The White House said on Tuesday all wire services, including Reuters and Bloomberg, would no longer hold a permanent spot in the press pool. The AP argued the new policy was in clear violation of the prior order and was a pretext for further retaliation against the AP.

The AP filing does not propose a specific course of action but urges the judge to ensure immediate compliance with his order.

The White House argues the AP does not have a right to what the administration has called special access to the president.

A White House official said the changes to the press pool were necessary to "ensure that the President’s message reaches targeted audiences and that outlets with applicable subject-matter expertise are present as events warrant."

Reuters and the AP both issued statements denouncing the new policy, which puts wire services in a larger rotation with about 30 other newspaper and print outlets.

Other media customers, including local news organizations that have no presence in Washington, rely on the wire services' real-time reports of presidential statements as do global financial markets.

The AP says in its stylebook that the Gulf of Mexico has carried that name for more than 400 years and, as a global news agency, the AP will refer to it by its original name while acknowledging the new name Trump has chosen.

The AP, formed in 1846, says on its website that it operates from nearly 250 locations in nearly 100 countries. Its journalists provide news to customers worldwide in text, photos, graphics and video.