Trump Doesn’t Understand How Journalism Works

When CNN’s Kaitlan Collins approached President Trump with a question about the Iran war at the United Nations General Assembly yesterday, the president scolded her for being there at all.

“I’m surprised that CNN is here covering me,” Trump said, adding, “You should not be here covering me.” Presumably, he said this because CNN is among the three outlets , along with MS NOW and Politico , that Trump has barred from White House grounds because he didn’t like their coverage.

But, to state the obvious, the United Nations is not the White House.

If a journalist is denied a press pass from one entity, she’s not precluded from getting credentialed by another.

As Collins said to Trump, “The United Nations allowed us in, sir.” The exchange highlights Trump’s warped understanding of journalism—in which stories are either good or bad, reporters are “ friendly ” or “ terrible ,” and a president decides who covers him and who doesn’t.

“There’s something wrong with a country that can allow people to write purposely negative stories,” he said when he banned CNN and the other two outlets.

“Now, if they want to write them, that’s fine.

But I don’t have to let them into my—into the people’s house.” As Trump noted when he corrected himself, the White House serves the American people—but so does the press.

Since the days of FDR, a cadre of rotating print, TV, and radio reporters have traveled with the president wherever he goes, including on weekends and holidays, to provide an unbroken and independent record of everything the president says and does in public.

This press pool exists because not every reporter can constantly trail the president; neither can every citizen.

Political reporters stand in for people who want to know what their most important elected representative is doing, but who have day jobs. [ Read: President Piggy ] The importance of the pool became especially visible this week when, in solidarity, the other four networks that typically share pool duties with CNN—ABC, CBS, Fox News, and NBC— suspended their pool coverage of the president.

This led to an unintentionally Veep -like moment during Trump’s unveiling of his new helipad, when no networks provided audio as Trump appeared flanked by smiling construction workers, speaking without sound. (A Newsmax host gingerly described the scene as a sign that the CNN ban was perhaps “backfiring just a little bit.”) Trump has a long history with the press—and of seeming not to understand how it works. (As with many things pertaining to the president, however, determining whether his ignorance is genuine or strategic can be difficult.) At times, he has appeared to feign confusion in an effort to get reporters to do what he wants.