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  "slug": "what-is-the-white-house-press-pool",
  "title": "What is the White House press pool?",
  "dek": "The White House press pool is the small rotating group of reporters who cover the US president in tight spaces. Who picks it, who pays, what changed.",
  "body_md": "The White House press pool is a small, rotating group of reporters, photographers and television and radio crews who cover the president of the United States in places too small for the whole press corps, such as the Oval Office, the president's office, and Air Force One, the president's aircraft, and who share what they gather with every other outlet ([glossary: press pool](/glossary/press-pool)). For more than a century the White House Correspondents' Association chose which outlets rotated into the pool, and since February 25, 2025, the White House has made that choice itself ([record](/incidents/2025-whca-loses-control-of-press-pool)).\n\n## What is the White House press pool, and who is in it?\n\nThe White House is the office and residence of the president of the United States in Washington, D.C. On the White House grounds, the pool is \"typically a group of 20 correspondents from wire services, print outlets, TV and radio, along with photojournalists and sound operators,\" according to the [White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA)](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/), the organization of reporters who cover the president ([glossary: WHCA](/glossary/whca)).\n\nOf the pool members, the print reporter on duty writes a [pool report](/glossary/pool-report), which is emailed to the full press corps and to a longer list kept by the White House Press Office, the president's communications staff ([WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/)). The TV crew, the radio correspondent and still photographers share video, audio and pictures the same way, so that other media outlets not in the room can report the same facts ([AP via MPR News](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/09/22/what-is-the-white-house-pool-its-a-battleground-between-trump-and-free-press-rights)).\n\nFor print reporters, the WHCA wrote that \"roughly 32 print outlets serve in this in-town pool, so each gets a turn about once a month,\" and that \"AP, Bloomberg and Reuters have permanent slots in the pool\" ([WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/)). That description predates April 15, 2025, when the White House ended the wire services' guaranteed seat (see the table below).\n\n## Who pays for pool coverage?\n\nThe news outlets pay. The WHCA calls daily coverage of the president \"a solemn obligation that news organizations undertake at their own expense\" ([WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/)). According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a press freedom organization based in Paris, the television pool is \"an arrangement among ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and Fox News to take turns covering presidential events, intended to spread the financial and logistical burden among the five stations\" ([RSF, 2026-09-22](https://rsf.org/en/usa-white-house-media-ban-robs-public-access-independent-presidential-coverage)). The five networks supply the live coverage and footage that other media outlets use.\n\nPool duty, the WHCA says, \"requires 13 journalists to be on assignment\" from call time to the \"lid,\" the notice from aides that the president will not appear in public again that day ([WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/)).\n\n## Why does the press pool matter?\n\nPool reporters covering the president have travelled with presidents since Franklin Roosevelt, president of the United States from 1933 to 1945; three wire service reporters were with him at Warm Springs, Georgia, when he died in 1945, according to the [WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/). The pool was in President John F. Kennedy's motorcade in Dallas on November 22, 1963, when he was assassinated ([AP via MPR News](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/09/22/what-is-the-white-house-pool-its-a-battleground-between-trump-and-free-press-rights)).\n\nThe WHCA's stated rationale is that \"the American public must never come to depend on a president's aides alone to provide the world with information on his activities\" ([WHCA](https://whca.press/covering-the-white-house/)).\n\n## Who controls the White House press pool now?\n\nOn February 11, 2025, the Trump administration began excluding Associated Press (AP) journalists from the Oval Office and Air Force One after the AP kept the name \"Gulf of Mexico\" in its style guide ([record](/incidents/2025-white-house-bars-ap-gulf-of-america)). President Donald Trump said, \"We're going to keep them out until such time as they agree that it's the Gulf of America,\" according to [NPR](https://www.npr.org/2025/02/21/nx-s1-5305226/ap-sues-white-house-gulf-of-america-mexico-trump).\n\nOn February 25, 2025, the White House announced that it would select the pool itself. The WHCA said the change \"suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president\" ([WHCA statement](https://whca.press/2025/02/25/whca-statement-on-white-house-announcement-on-press-pool/); [record](/incidents/2025-whca-loses-control-of-press-pool)). As of September 22, 2026, \"the White House now picks and chooses which members of the media make up the pool,\" according to the [AP](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/09/22/what-is-the-white-house-pool-its-a-battleground-between-trump-and-free-press-rights).\n\nThe AP sued. On June 6, 2025, a panel of the D.C. Circuit, the federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., allowed the exclusion to continue for the Oval Office, Air Force One, Mar-a-Lago and the Cabinet Room, by 2 to 1 ([case record](/cases/ap-v-budowich-2025)). Judge Neomi Rao wrote that \"these restricted presidential spaces are not First Amendment fora opened for private speech and discussion\" ([CNN](https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/06/politics/white-house-ban-associated-press-continue)).\n\n### Pool changes, 2025 to 2026\n\n| Date | Action | Status as of 2026-09-22 |\n|---|---|---|\n| 2025-02-11 | AP excluded from Oval Office and Air Force One ([record](/incidents/2025-white-house-bars-ap-gulf-of-america)) | Partly in effect; on appeal |\n| 2025-02-25 | White House takes over pool selection from the WHCA ([record](/incidents/2025-whca-loses-control-of-press-pool)) | In effect |\n| 2025-04-15 | Wire services lose their guaranteed daily seat ([record](/incidents/2025-white-house-cuts-wire-service-pool-slot)) | In effect |\n| 2026-09-19 | Hard passes of CNN, MS NOW and Politico reporters deactivated ([record](/incidents/2026-white-house-bans-cnn-msnow-politico)) | In effect; case pending |\n| 2026-09-20 | Other TV networks decline to replace CNN's pool crew ([AP via Action News Now](https://www.actionnewsnow.com/news/major-tv-networks-stand-with-cnn-decline-to-replace-its-white-house-pool-crew/article_47bdc4b7-11bd-5c5a-a581-dabefc858a0b.html)) | TV pool not covering the president |\n\nOn April 15, 2025, the White House said outlets would be eligible for the pool \"regardless of the substantive viewpoint expressed by an outlet\"; the AP called the removal of the wire seat \"a grave disservice to the American people\" ([Fox News](https://www.foxnews.com/media/associated-press-reuters-rip-trump-white-house-cutting-wire-service-slot-press-pool)).\n\n## What happened to the TV pool in September 2026?\n\nOn September 18, 2026, President Donald Trump announced that CNN, MS NOW and Politico would be banned from the White House, describing their coverage as \"FICTION and LIES\" ([NPR](https://www.npr.org/2026/09/19/nx-s1-5974854/trump-cnn-msnow-politico-ban); [record](/incidents/2026-white-house-bans-cnn-msnow-politico)). On September 19, their reporters were denied entry at the gates after their hard passes, the standing credentials that let reporters enter the White House press area, were deactivated ([record](/incidents/2026-white-house-bans-cnn-msnow-politico)).\n\nAfter the White House deactivated the passes, banning CNN from its scheduled pool duty on Monday, September 21, the other pool reporters' networks said, \"There will be no replacement pool put in place\" ([AP via Action News Now](https://www.actionnewsnow.com/news/major-tv-networks-stand-with-cnn-decline-to-replace-its-white-house-pool-crew/article_47bdc4b7-11bd-5c5a-a581-dabefc858a0b.html)). The pool's email to subscribers said, \"Effective today, there would be no network pool coverage of the president's events\" ([AP via MPR News](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/09/22/what-is-the-white-house-pool-its-a-battleground-between-trump-and-free-press-rights)). RSF reported that Bryan Boughton, Fox News' Washington bureau chief, coordinates the television pool ([RSF](https://rsf.org/en/usa-white-house-media-ban-robs-public-access-independent-presidential-coverage)).\n\nThe three news outlets sued on September 21, 2026, in Cable News Network, Inc. v. Trump, No. 1:26-cv-03287, which is pending with a hearing scheduled for September 23 ([case record](/cases/cnn-msnow-politico-v-trump-2026)).\n\n## Do other governments control press access the same way?\n\nThe record files these actions under [access bans](/tactics/access_ban), and the [access-ban ladder](/ladders/access_ban) sets them beside other countries' cases. In the Philippines on February 21, 2018, a Rappler reporter was told she was barred from Malacañang Palace, the seat of the presidency, on President Rodrigo Duterte's orders; his spokesperson cited \"fake news\" ([record](/incidents/2018-philippines-bans-rappler-presidential-palace)). In Hungary on March 10, 2026, a mayor from the governing Fidesz party removed two Telex reporters from a campaign forum ([record](/incidents/2026-hungary-mayor-removes-telex-reporters)).\n",
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