US networks halt coverage of Trump in extraordinary revolt over White House ban

WASHINGTON — American television networks staged an extraordinary revolt Monday when they effectively boycotted coverage of US President Donald Trump in protest at his decision to ban three leading outlets from the White House.

CNN, MS NOW and Politico also went to court after Trump on Friday ordered them to be barred, as the 80-year-old Republican stepped up his years-long assault on the mainstream US media.

As a result of the spat, Trump’s opening of his cherished new White House helipad and his trip to the United Nations General Assembly proceeded without live television coverage.

In a rare move, the top five US broadcasters said on Monday that they were halting “pool” coverage of the White House — where a broadcaster films on behalf of all television outlets for the day — in solidarity with CNN.

CNN had been scheduled to serve Monday as the White House TV pool.

“The public has a vital interest in receiving accurate, independent information about its government. No administration should restrict a news organization because it objects to its reporting,” ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC said in a statement.

The result is an almost unprecedented test of wills between the Trump administration and the press, in a critical week during which Chinese President Xi Jinping is visiting the White House.

Media ‘like cancer’

There may be no live TV of Trump’s meetings with foreign leaders at the UN in New York, an annual forum that is closely watched around the world.

Meanwhile, the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the giant granite helipad on the South Lawn was only streamed on the White House’s website — and Trump’s comments were completely inaudible.

Donald Trump couldn’t be heard at today’s White House event due to an absent press pool.

The press are currently boycotting White House pool coverage in response to the Trump administration’s ban on CNN and other outlets. pic.twitter.com/CxMqIA79G0

— Pop Base (@PopBase) September 21, 2026

Several photo news organizations working at the White House, including AFP, AP, The Washington Post and The New York Times, decided to delay the release of photographs of Trump at the helipad in solidarity with the three banned media organizations.

Trump was unrepentant, branding the media a “cancer” and a threat to national security.

“The White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish,” Trump said on his Truth Social network. “It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like Cancer in our beloved United States of America.”

On Monday evening, the White House launched a streaming channel, “Trump TV,” which it said would show “top videos, major remarks, and must-see highlights streaming 24/7 and updated in real time.”

When it went online, it was showing archive footage of Trump delivering a speech on July 3 at Mount Rushmore. The stream had only about 8,000 live views 15 minutes after it was launched on YouTube.

“This just makes it even clearer that the real goal here is to ensure that the American public is fed a steady diet of government propaganda,” said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.

US Vice President JD Vance — a former CNN commentator before his move into politics — accused the news outlets of disseminating “left-wing propaganda.”

“They can still report. They still have the access to free speech. They’re just not going to get an office in the White House anymore,” he told reporters.

Press pass confiscated

Trump’s ban, however, went further than simply revoking office space from the outlets.

Journalists from CNN, MS NOW and Politico were denied any access to the White House grounds on Saturday and had their passes confiscated.

In their lawsuit, the three organizations asked for a temporary restraining order against the ban on the grounds that it violates the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which upholds the right to a free press.

“This morning, we notified the government that we are filing a lawsuit today to protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes,” the banned outlets said in a joint statement posted early Monday on X. “Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”

In the joint complaint, accompanied by a separate request for a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the bans, the outlets said: “This ban could not be a more direct assault on the First Amendment nor a more blatant violation of our most fundamental constitutional principles.”

In legal terms, it’s known as “viewpoint discrimination” — the government singling out specific media outlets for the content of what they say or publish. That legal principle is at issue in many of the court cases around Trump’s treatment of the media and would likely be at play this time.

A US district judge set a hearing on the complaint for Wednesday.

Trump’s sudden announcement of the ban on Friday stunned the media — and reportedly many in his own administration.

The president has not detailed what prompted the ban, but said in response to a question from an AFP reporter in the Oval Office on Friday that it was “really just cumulative stories over the last two years.”

Trump warned Friday that other outlets could face a similar fate, without saying which.

The billionaire former reality TV star has long attacked media outlets that have aired critical coverage of his campaigns and administrations, repeatedly blasting the press as the “enemy of the people.”

But the ban comes at a time when his approval ratings are at record lows, his Republican Party risks losing control of Congress in November’s midterm elections, and the Iran war drags on with no end in sight.