House Majority Leader Steve Scalise tried to invoke former President Joe Biden while being pressed Sunday about Donald Trump’s decision to bar three major news organizations from the White House.
ABC’s Jonathan Karl immediately challenged the comparison.
The exchange unfolded on This Week, where Karl asked Scalise a straightforward question about Trump’s decision to ban CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO.
“Do you support him banning these news organizations because he doesn’t like what they’re reporting?” Karl asked.
Scalise did not initially give Karl a direct yes-or-no answer.
Instead, he defended Trump’s overall relationship with reporters.
“I don’t think we’ve had a president that’s been more open to the press,” Scalise said, pointing to Trump’s willingness to take questions during White House events.
Then he brought up Biden.
“Joe Biden removed the press credentials from over 400 different agencies,” Scalise said.
Karl immediately intervened.
“That’s actually not true about Biden,” he responded.
Karl explained that the roughly 400 people involved were individual reporters whose credentials expired and who did not reapply under revised Biden-era requirements.
“There was only one that was actually denied a credential,” Karl said.
And then came the crucial distinction.
Karl said those who did not reapply could still enter the White House through the regular daily credentialing process.
“They were not banned from the White House,” Karl said.
“That did not happen!”
The exchange matters because the comparison to Biden has emerged as a defense of Trump’s latest action against CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO.
The Biden White House did introduce new requirements for permanent White House press passes in 2023, resulting in hundreds of existing “hard passes” expiring.
But that was not equivalent to banning hundreds of news organizations from the White House.
Trump’s action against the three outlets is different.
On Friday, the president announced that he was banning CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO from the White House because of coverage he characterized as “fake news.”
And by Saturday, the order was being enforced.
CNN senior White House reporter Betsy Klein, MS NOW White House reporter Akayla Gardner and POLITICO White House reporter Cheyenne Haslett were all denied entry. Their credentials were deactivated or confiscated, according to the outlets and Associated Press reporting.
Karl therefore returned to the question he had originally asked Scalise.
Trump “is now banning CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House,” Karl said.
“Do you support him doing that? Do you think it violates the First Amendment?”
Scalise responded that he did not know enough about the circumstances behind Trump’s decision.
“I don’t know why he did it,” Scalise said. “I don’t know what the background is.”
He again defended Trump’s willingness to engage with reporters, including journalists who ask hostile questions.
“I’ve never seen him turn a question down from anybody,” Scalise said.
Karl waited for him to finish.
Then the ABC anchor pointed out the obvious complication with that argument.
“I guess he’s not going to be taking questions, at least from those three news organizations,” Karl said, “because they are banned from the White House.”
The White House press restrictions are no longer merely an announcement.
Reporters from all three organizations were turned away Saturday, and the outlets have indicated they could pursue legal action. The White House Correspondents’ Association has also called for their access to be restored.
Scalise’s appearance ultimately left Karl’s central question unresolved.
He praised Trump’s accessibility to reporters. He brought up Biden. He said he did not know the background behind Trump’s decision.
But he did not give Karl a direct answer on whether he supported banning the three organizations.
And when he tried to bolster his argument with the claim about hundreds of Biden-era press credentials, Karl was ready with a correction.
“That did not happen!”
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