(8 Apr 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
++CLIENTS NOTE: THE STATEMENTS BY AP EXECUTIVE EDITOR JULIE PACE INCLUDED IN THIS EDIT WERE MADE ON 18 MARCH 2025; WEEKS BEFORE TODAY’S COURT RULING++
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: New York – 21 February 2025
1. Close-up of the AP logo
2. Tracking shot of images on wall inside AP newsroom
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: New York – 18 March 2025
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Julie Pace, Executive Editor, The Associated Press:
"We pursued every possible avenue before taking legal action. But we must stand on principle. For the Associated Press, for our thousands of customers and their audiences, and for every news organization and every person in the United States."
++BLACK FRAMES++
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Julie Pace, Executive Editor, The Associated Press:
"The AP remains steadfast in its mission to independently inform the world with accurate, factual and nonpartisan news, as it has for nearly 180 years. The AP has no corporate owner and no shareholders. We are independent, beholden to the facts and the public’s right to know. If we don’t step up to defend the right of Americans to speak freely, who will?"
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: New York – 21 February 2025
5. Pan of AP board with inscription reading (English) "THE ASSOCIATED PRESS – Advancing the Power of Facts"
STORYLINE:
A federal judge ordered the White House on Tuesday to restore The Associated Press’ full access to cover presidential events, ruling on a case that touched at the heart of the First Amendment and affirming that the government cannot punish the news organization for the content of its speech.
U.S.. District Judge Trevor N. McFadden, an appointee of President Donald Trump, ruled that the government can’t retaliate against the AP’s decision not to follow Trump’s executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico. The decision handed the AP a major victory at a time the White House has been challenging the press on several levels.
“Under the First Amendment, if the Government opens its doors to some journalists — be it to the Oval Office, the East Room, or elsewher — it cannot then shut those doors to other journalists because of their viewpoints,” McFadden wrote. “The Constitution requires no less.”
It was unclear whether the White House would move immediately to put McFadden’s ruling into effect. McFadden held off on implementing his order for a week, giving the government time to respond or appeal.
The AP has been blocked since Feb. 11 from being among the small group of journalists to cover Trump in the Oval Office or aboard Air Force One, with sporadic ability to cover him at events in East Room.
The organization had asked McFadden to rule that Trump had violated AP’s constitutional right to free speech by taking the action because he disagreed with the words that its journalists use. He had earlier declined AP’s request to reverse the changes through an injunction.
TRUMP CAME OUT AND SAID WHY HE MADE THE MOVE
While there was little dispute in a March 27 court hearing about why Trump struck back at the AP – the president said as much – the administration said it was up to its own discretion, and not White House correspondents or longstanding tradition, to determine who gets to question the president and when.
Since the dispute with AP began, the White House has taken steps to control who gets to cover the president at smaller events and even where journalists sit during press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s briefings, saying both need to better reflect changes in how people get information.
TESTIMONY REVEALED AP’S COVERAGE HAS BEEN IMPEDED
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Author: AP Archive
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