Update 10:57 a.m. ET A federal judge in Washington ruled Friday in favor of CNN in a decision that represents the first legal blows between Trump and the<\/b>
\nUpdate 10:57 a.m. ET
A federal judge in Washington ruled Friday in favor of CNN in a decision that represents the first legal blows between Trump and the news media.
Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee, ordered the White House to restore correspondent Jim Acosta’s press credentials.
\u00ab\u00a0Each day he [Acosta] is deprived… suffers a harm that cannot be remedied in retrospect,\u00a0\u00bb Kelly said.
This is not the end of the road in this fight. The judge told attorneys for the Trump administration that the White House has to establish standardized rules to justify taking away a pass to cover the White House and wants to hear from both sides again Tuesday.
This was also granted on a limited basis and was not on First Amendment ground, but the Fifth Amendment’s right to due process. The judge said the White House denied Acosta’s right to due process under the law.
Whatever process occurred is \u00ab\u00a0shrouded in mystery,\u00a0\u00bb Kelly said.
\u00ab\u00a0I want to thank all of my colleagues in the press who supported us this week,\u00a0\u00bb Acosta said outside the DC courthouse. He thanked the judge for the decision he made. \u00ab\u00a0Let’s get back to work.\u00a0\u00bb
CNN attorney Ted Boutrous called it a \u00ab\u00a0great day for the First Amendment and for journalism\u00a0\u00bb (although the First Amendment was not applied here).
It’s very possible the White House drops the case and instead comes up with some level of varying standards that could again be challenged by the press in court. The next steps remain to be seen.
The lawsuit follows the Trump administration’s decision last week to withdraw White House press credentials from Acosta after he and President Trump had a testy exchange during a news conference on Nov. 7. The suit sought the immediate restoration of Acosta’s press pass, arguing on First Amendment grounds that the White House action was aimed at silencing the journalist.
CNN was joined by other news media organizations, who saw high stakes in the case that could cede a degree of editorial control to the White House and threaten the ability of a free press to be a check on presidential power.
The Trump administration argued that the president has broad discretion to strip any reporter of White House press credentials if he wishes. It argued that the standard should be whether the reporter was \u00ab\u00a0disorderly,\u00a0\u00bb \u00ab\u00a0rude\u00a0\u00bb or \u00ab\u00a0grandstanding.\u00a0\u00bb
CNN’s lawyers argued that sometimes democracy is \u00ab\u00a0unpleasant\u00a0\u00bb but having a free press is one of the ways democracies hold governments accountable.
Under questioning from the judge in arguments Wednesday, Deputy Assistant Attorney General James Burnham, who made the case for the administration, conceded that he knew of no other case in which a president had revoked a reporter’s White House credentials.
Kelly noted that there have been plenty of contentious, unrelenting journalists covering presidents through the years \u2014 and none had ever been stripped of their ability to cover the White House.
The judge also pressed CNN’s attorneys, noting that there were plenty of other CNN journalists covering the White House.
Boutrous argued that the Trump administration’s views on the First Amendment are \u00ab\u00a0warped,\u00a0\u00bb and that there’s no First Amendment doctrine that says, \u00ab\u00a0Because there are lots of other reporters you can ban one.\u00a0\u00bb
President Trump has gone so far as to call journalists the \u00ab\u00a0enemy of the people\u00a0\u00bb and, at his rallies, crowds frequently break into chants of \u00ab\u00a0CNN Sucks\u00a0\u00bb as he routinely brands as \u00ab\u00a0fake news\u00a0\u00bb any coverage he deems unflattering.
In particular, he has been enraged at the media for not giving him more positive coverage after winning the 2016 presidential election.
\u00ab\u00a0The press treats me terribly,\u00a0\u00bb he told Lesley Stahl on CBS’s 60 Minutes . \u00ab\u00a0I thought very strongly that, you know, the one great thing will happen is the press will start treating me great [once he won the presidency]. Lesley, they treat me worse. They got worse instead of better. Very dishonest…. I regret that the press treats me so badly.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n

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