Washington
CNN threatens new legal action, saying it’s still being denied access to Air Force One
Already embroiled in a tense legal standoff with the White House, CNN is threatening further action in the courts if its journalists continue to be denied access to Air Force One and the “pool” of journalists who accompany President Donald Trump when he travels.
The network has been entangled in legal action with Trump’s administration ever since the president issued its reporters a sudden ban from White House grounds a month ago, along with those from MS NOW and Politico, calling their content “fake news.” Last week, a federal judge granted the news outlets their request for a preliminary injunction against the government ban as the case moves through the legal system.
But that only addresses part of the problem.
The White House has continued to bar CNN from taking its place in TV pool coverage of Trump’s travel on Air Force One. And so the network may need to take additional action, said Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., an attorney for CNN, in a letter to Justice Department attorney Michael K. Velchik.
Boutrous noted in the letter late Monday that CNN has traditionally had “uninterrupted access to the Oval Office and Air Force One for 45 years. That is because those spaces belong not to any particular president or administration but to all Americans, and CNN and other members of the press serve as surrogates for the public when covering the White House.”
Now, though, the White House is engaging in “what appears to be a new unstated policy to interfere with CNN’s ability to fulfill its duties” as part ot the video pool. The pool consists of the five major U.S. networks: ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox, who alternate assignments and share video.
Boutrous noted that in his most recent ruling, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly had found the three media outlets were likely to succeed on the merits of their claim that the White House violated the First Amendment and due process with Trump’s ban, and thus were entitled to the relief they requested.
Still, though, the White House has selectively denied CNN access to cover the president’s travel on Air Force One — no fewer than four times to date, Boutrous wrote.
Such “efforts to retaliate and discriminate against CNN based on the content of its news coverage are mistaken, counterproductive, and unlawful,” the attorney wrote.
“If these actions persist, CNN will have no choice but to return to the court to defend its rights, and it is prepared to fight as long as is necessary to secure them.”
The Justice Department did not respond to a query from The Associated Press seeking reaction to the letter, in which Boutrous gave the White House two days to respond.
The extraordinary showdown between Trump and CNN, whose personalities he has mocked publicly, began more than a month ago. Trump announced on Sept. 18 that he was barring the network’s reporters, along with those from MS NOW and Politico, from White House grounds. The next day, journalists found their passes had been deactivated.
It was a marked escalation of Trump’s long-running efforts — in the courts and through administrative action — to restrict news coverage he finds objectionable, and a test of First Amendment protections in the United States.
Kelly first granted relief from the ban for two weeks, then granted the open-ended preliminary injunction last week.
And yet, the letter said, the network had been denied access to Air Force One in September for Trump’s visit to the U.N. General Assembly, for a football game in Knoxville, Tennessee, and for a trip to Texas and Oklahoma. This month, it was denied access to the plane for a trip to Georgia and Florida. In all cases, CNN was the scheduled pool network.
There has, however, been no explanation from the White House, Boutrous wrote. “In fact, the White House has not even directly stated to CNN that it is being excluded from the Oval Office or Air Force One.”
Washington
Mahmoud Khalil asks high court to let U.S. judges quickly reverse immigration detentions
WASHINGTON (AP) — Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil asked the Supreme Court on Monday to let federal judges quickly determine the legality of immigration-related detentions so that people cannot be held for months or years without judicial oversight.
In papers filed with the high court, Khalil asked it to overturn a ruling earlier this year by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia that found federal courts do not have jurisdiction to review the legality of the detentions until immigration courts had fully considered each case.
Khalil, a lawful permanent U.S. resident, was detained by immigration authorities last year because of his participation in pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia University in the spring of 2024.
The U.S. government argued at the time that Khalil’s presence in the U.S. was harmful to the country’s foreign policy interests.
As a result, the former Columbia graduate student spent over three months in detention before a federal judge in New Jersey ordered him freed after finding that the federal government had acted unconstitutionally.
Khalil told a remote news conference Monday that the appeal was “bigger than just my ability to stay here.” He said he wanted to ensure that thousands of immigrants, documented or not, can challenge the Trump administration’s “unlawful” attempts to stop protected speech.
He said the administration knows “all too well its baseless allegations and smears against me cannot survive the slightest scrutiny in federal courts,” so it wants to channel it into “kangaroo” immigration courts where it can control the outcome.
In a statement Monday, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said: “It is a privilege to be granted a visa or green card to live and study in the United States of America. The Trump Administration acted well within its statutory and constitutional authority with respect to Khalil, as it does with any alien who advocates for violence, glorifies and supports terrorists, harasses Jews, and damages property. We would encourage him to use the CBP Home app and self-deport.”
The 3rd Circuit has put its ruling on hold so that Khalil could appeal to the Supreme Court. He remains free.
Although the Supreme Court typically agrees to grant only a small percentage of appeals requests, the U.S. government has already asked the high court to overturn a federal appeals court decision that upheld a judge’s decision to release Georgetown University scholar Badar Khan Suri. That ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, directly conflicted with the 3rd Circuit decision in the Khalil case.
Sometimes, conflicting appeals court rulings can increase the chances that the Supreme Court agrees to hear a case. If it does, oral arguments before the justices would likely occur sometime next year.
CNN threatens new legal action, saying it’s still being denied access to Air Force One
Already embroiled in a tense legal standoff with the White House, CNN is threatening further action in the courts if its journalists continue to be denied access to Air Force One and the “pool” of journalists who accompany President Donald Trump when he travels.
The network has been entangled in legal action with Trump’s administration ever since the president issued its reporters a sudden ban from White House grounds a month ago, along with those from MS NOW and Politico, calling their content “fake news.” Last week, a federal judge granted the news outlets their request for a preliminary injunction against the government ban as the case moves through the legal system.
But that only addresses part of the problem.
The White House has continued to bar CNN from taking its place in TV pool coverage of Trump’s travel on Air Force One. And so the network may need to take additional action, said Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., an attorney for CNN, in a letter to Justice Department attorney Michael K. Velchik.
Boutrous noted in the letter late Monday that CNN has traditionally had “uninterrupted access to the Oval Office and Air Force One for 45 years. That is because those spaces belong not to any particular president or administration but to all Americans, and CNN and other members of the press serve as surrogates for the public when covering the White House.”
Now, though, the White House is engaging in “what appears to be a new unstated policy to interfere with CNN’s ability to fulfill its duties” as part ot the video pool. The pool consists of the five major U.S. networks: ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox, who alternate assignments and share video.
Boutrous noted that in his most recent ruling, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly had found the three media outlets were likely to succeed on the merits of their claim that the White House violated the First Amendment and due process with Trump’s ban, and thus were entitled to the relief they requested.
Still, though, the White House has selectively denied CNN access to cover the president’s travel on Air Force One — no fewer than four times to date, Boutrous wrote.
Such “efforts to retaliate and discriminate against CNN based on the content of its news coverage are mistaken, counterproductive, and unlawful,” the attorney wrote.
“If these actions persist, CNN will have no choice but to return to the court to defend its rights, and it is prepared to fight as long as is necessary to secure them.”
The Justice Department did not respond to a query from The Associated Press seeking reaction to the letter, in which Boutrous gave the White House two days to respond.
The extraordinary showdown between Trump and CNN, whose personalities he has mocked publicly, began more than a month ago. Trump announced on Sept. 18 that he was barring the network’s reporters, along with those from MS NOW and Politico, from White House grounds. The next day, journalists found their passes had been deactivated.
It was a marked escalation of Trump’s long-running efforts — in the courts and through administrative action — to restrict news coverage he finds objectionable, and a test of First Amendment protections in the United States.
Kelly first granted relief from the ban for two weeks, then granted the open-ended preliminary injunction last week.
And yet, the letter said, the network had been denied access to Air Force One in September for Trump’s visit to the U.N. General Assembly, for a football game in Knoxville, Tennessee, and for a trip to Texas and Oklahoma. This month, it was denied access to the plane for a trip to Georgia and Florida. In all cases, CNN was the scheduled pool network.
There has, however, been no explanation from the White House, Boutrous wrote. “In fact, the White House has not even directly stated to CNN that it is being excluded from the Oval Office or Air Force One.”
Washington
Mahmoud Khalil asks high court to let U.S. judges quickly reverse immigration detentions
WASHINGTON (AP) — Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil asked the Supreme Court on Monday to let federal judges quickly determine the legality of immigration-related detentions so that people cannot be held for months or years without judicial oversight.
In papers filed with the high court, Khalil asked it to overturn a ruling earlier this year by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia that found federal courts do not have jurisdiction to review the legality of the detentions until immigration courts had fully considered each case.
Khalil, a lawful permanent U.S. resident, was detained by immigration authorities last year because of his participation in pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia University in the spring of 2024.
The U.S. government argued at the time that Khalil’s presence in the U.S. was harmful to the country’s foreign policy interests.
As a result, the former Columbia graduate student spent over three months in detention before a federal judge in New Jersey ordered him freed after finding that the federal government had acted unconstitutionally.
Khalil told a remote news conference Monday that the appeal was “bigger than just my ability to stay here.” He said he wanted to ensure that thousands of immigrants, documented or not, can challenge the Trump administration’s “unlawful” attempts to stop protected speech.
He said the administration knows “all too well its baseless allegations and smears against me cannot survive the slightest scrutiny in federal courts,” so it wants to channel it into “kangaroo” immigration courts where it can control the outcome.
In a statement Monday, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said: “It is a privilege to be granted a visa or green card to live and study in the United States of America. The Trump Administration acted well within its statutory and constitutional authority with respect to Khalil, as it does with any alien who advocates for violence, glorifies and supports terrorists, harasses Jews, and damages property. We would encourage him to use the CBP Home app and self-deport.”
The 3rd Circuit has put its ruling on hold so that Khalil could appeal to the Supreme Court. He remains free.
Although the Supreme Court typically agrees to grant only a small percentage of appeals requests, the U.S. government has already asked the high court to overturn a federal appeals court decision that upheld a judge’s decision to release Georgetown University scholar Badar Khan Suri. That ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, directly conflicted with the 3rd Circuit decision in the Khalil case.
Sometimes, conflicting appeals court rulings can increase the chances that the Supreme Court agrees to hear a case. If it does, oral arguments before the justices would likely occur sometime next year.
