The ‘shenanigans’ continue…
Happy Monday. Here’s the latest from President Trump, Evan Gershkovich, Monica Hesse, Harry Smith, the Boston Globe and much more…
In court last week to fight the ban on CNN, MS NOW and Politico, attorney Ted Boutrous said he was concerned that “the shenanigans will continue.”
And that’s what we’re seeing now — more “shenanigans” as the Trump White House tries to control news coverage.
On Saturday, the White House blocked CNN from going on President Trump’s trip to Tennessee, even though it was CNN’s turn to be the TV pool crew.
But then, on Sunday night, the White House sent around its pool rotation list for the week ahead, and CNN is listed as the TV pool this Thursday.
So will the network actually be allowed to fulfill its pool responsibilities? Will the answer to that question depend on the president’s mood?
It seems that the Trump administration is trying to test the legal limits and see what it can get away with. Last week, as you know, Judge Timothy Kelly issued a temporary restraining order reinstating White House access for banned news outlets.
But as Reuters noted last week, “a Washington, D.C., appeals court held in June 2025 that Trump likely had the right to bar The Associated Press from certain spaces including the Oval Office” and Air Force One, “but not White House press facilities writ large.” That ruling is part of a larger case that is still pending.
In the new CNN/MS/Politico case, Boutrous and his team have to file a preliminary injunction request today. The White House’s refusal to let CNN on Air Force One will surely be folded in. Boutrous will want a larger victory on First Amendment grounds, since the initial ruling was just on Fifth Amendment due process grounds.
His words to Kelly last week were prescient: “I’m very concerned that even if the court grants a TRO on due process grounds, the shenanigans will continue.”
>> CNN’s Sunday headline from Aileen Graef: “Attorney general Todd Blanche says ‘one-sided news’ is a national security issue worthy of barring press.”
Last week the five major networks that make up the TV pool issued a public statement and declined to cover Trump events in a show of solidarity. It was heartening to see — but it was never a practical long-term plan.
On Sunday a new tentative plan took effect, and Fox News performed its pool duties as scheduled. “Each time that CNN comes up in the pool rotation, the group of networks will decide whether to provide a substitute crew,” the NYT’s Michael Grynbaum and Erik Wemple reported. “Otherwise, CNN’s slot will be left unfilled, and Mr. Trump will not receive major network coverage.”
The NYT story added this line: “The networks could agree to suspend the White House TV pool at any time.”
Small pro-Trump outlets like Real America’s Voice are portraying themselves as a replacement for the traditional pool, though there’s little sign that their video is being widely used…
Monica Hesse said it best in this WaPo column: “Philosophically, the press pool communicates that the executive branch of the United States belongs to the people. That the president’s words and actions should be visible to all of us. The government should be an open book. This is so important that competing news organizations agree to share with one another and with the public as part of a broader and loftier mission.”
That’s what Trump is trying to break.
On Saturday morning he went all-caps with this on Truth Social: “FAKE NEWS SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED IN THE WHITE HOUSE!!! IT HAS GONE ON FAR TOO LONG, AT A TREMENDOUS COST TO OUR COUNTRY.”
It’s a useful post because it encapsulates what the president really thinks. Notice that he didn’t invoke “national security” or case law. He simply said “fake news” shouldn’t be “allowed” near him. And who decides if the news is fake or real? He does.
Case in point: Later in the day, Trump posted a screed about a “fake story” that Rep. Byron Donalds “is taking me off his website and Campaign materials.” The story had “no sources,” he claimed. In fact, the sourcing was obvious: Reporters compared Donalds’ old website with his new website and pointed out that most of the Trump references were gone.
There are hundreds of examples just like this, when Trump has shown what he really means by “fake.”
In a country where 67% of Americans disapprove of his performance, it’s safe to say that most Americans don’t want him deciding what “real” news is.
CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale is out with a must-read essay reflecting on ten years of dissecting Trump’s claims.
Trump’s “relentless dishonesty has become a central feature of US and world politics,” Dale writes.
He knows some people shrug off Trump’s lies by saying “they all lie,” but “we are witnessing a rare, very possibly once-in-a-lifetime political liar.”
Some of Dale’s takeaways: “The bigger the crisis, the more Trump lies.” Trump “is not only a supplier of bad information but a consumer of it.” The media “doesn’t handle Trump’s lying well enough.” And “the lies cause real harm.” Read it all here…
White House aides are trying to act like these pro-Trump TV ads are a perfectly ordinary use of tax dollars. They’re not. As ABC alum Terry Moran put it last night, “There is no precedent for the federal government taking an incumbent president’s actual campaign material, purchasing national TV airtime for it during a campaign, and putting ‘Paid for by the U.S. Government’ at the end.” Moran called it “theft.”
CNN’s Stephen Collinson has a new column this morning about one of the ads. He writes, “The idea that the spot is deliberately provocative is bolstered by the fact that Trump, with a war chest worth hundreds of millions of dollars, doesn’t need to use taxpayer cash.”
The Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent who was arrested while reporting in Russia in 2023 is coming out with his book, “This Cursed Beautiful Land,” tomorrow. This morning on “GMA,” George Stephanopoulos had the first interview with him.
“They bring me into the FSB station, and they just calmly tell me that they’re charging me with espionage. And, so, in the book, I described it as kind of like relief,” Gershkovich told Stephanopoulos. “I think because, one, I’m not going to be tortured, but two, it’s a swap case.” Gershkovich said he quickly came to that conclusion because of his previous reporting on Trevor Reed, Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan.
“But you’re sort of psychologically … it’s hard to continue to be rational, so you have these moments of, ‘Oh, this is for a swap,’ but then,” Gershkovich said.
“Anything can happen,” Stephanopoulos said.
“Anything can happen,” Gershkovich agreed.
In addition to the “GMA” interview, the Journal published the first excerpt from the book. Here’s a gift link to that powerful passage…
Jeremy Barr reminded everyone that there was no new episode of “60 Minutes” on Sunday “because of the MTV Video Music Awards, which means we won’t get to spend Monday-Wednesday fighting about What The Ratings Mean.” Thanks for the break, MTV 😉
Speaking of the VMAs, “Taylor Swift broke records” at the award show, taking home three prizes last night to become “the most-awarded artist in VMA history,” the AP’s Maria Sherman reports…
>> Nearly 5,000 MS NOW fans turned up for the network’s live event in Arlington, Texas over the weekend “as Texas’ Senate race draws national attention.” (Dallas Morning News)
>> Fox announced that Larry Kudlow is Maria Bartiromo’s replacement on “Sunday Morning Futures” through the midterms. (Variety)
>> Love this: Harry Smith is returning to NBC News as a contributor, two years after exiting his full-time correspondent role. (People)
>> What are the chances the president will “Truth” about this? Ashley Padilla played Natalie Harp on the “SNL” season opener. (Variety)
The story about the story: Hollywood is interested in potential adaptations of Annalisa Quinn’s mega-viral Boston Globe Magazine piece about a Western Massachusetts lesbian bar that sparked uproar by relaxing its masking requirement, THR’s Aaron Couch reports. According to insiders at UTA, which represents the Globe, the talent agency has been fielding inquiries about both scripted and documentary adaptations, Couch writes.
A Globe rep said the story “has certainly resonated with a wide range of audiences nationally and internationally. It is now one of the most-read stories we’ve published, and has already garnered many thousands of subscriptions…”
>> Drew Harwell chronicles how Amy Dangerfield “worked to become one of Nick Fuentes’s model ‘groypettes’” until “a vicious fight left her grappling with the dark side of far-right fame.” (WaPo)
>> Berber Jin and Keach Hagey profile “the doomers who shaped the AI safety freakout.” (WSJ)
>> Charlie Gasparino says “Rob Bonta’s Paramount–WBD debacle has created political chaos.” (NYPost)
>> Nate Jones says “federal agencies are embarking on a possibly game-changing project to speed up the handling of FOIA requests: using artificial intelligence to turbocharge redactions.” (WaPo)
“‘Avengers: Endgame Encore,’ a re-release of Disney and Marvel’s 2019 blockbuster (with extra footage!), emerged victorious at the domestic box office over several new releases,” generating $26 million in North America and $60 million overseas, for a global total of $86 million, Variety’s Rebecca Rubin writes.
“Excitement for the re-release certainly bodes well for the studio’s upcoming ‘Avengers: Doomsday,’ which opens in December and brings back nearly all of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes on another save-the-universe mission,” Rubin writes.
This edition of Reliable Sources was edited by Andrew Kirell and produced with Liam Reilly. Email us your feedback and tips here.