As part of the ongoing conflict between President Donald Trump and the media, the White House hand-picked journalists to attend a press-briefing on Friday, excluding some major news outlets.
CNN, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Politico, BuzzFeed, the BBC and the Guardian, were all excluded from the meeting held in the office of Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary. Reporters from The Associated Press and Time magazine were allowed into the gaggle but refused to attend.
This private meeting was instead of the normal on-camera meeting in the White House James S. Brady Press Briefing Room.
The White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) criticized the decision.
“The WHCA board is protesting strongly against how today’s gaggle is being handled by the White House,” Jeff Mason, the association’s president, said in a statement.
“We encourage the organizations that were allowed in to share the material with others in the press corps who were not,” he added. “The board will be discussing this further with White House staff.”
In an email statement quoted by The Hill, White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham wrote on Friday that “claims that outlets were excluded are not factual. The pool was there, so various media mediums were represented.”
