American legal scholar of the First Amendment and constitutional law; the Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a professor emeritus at UCLA School of Law. Founder and coauthor of The Volokh Conspiracy, a legal blog hosted at Reason.
Case
President Trump announced on September 18 that he is excluding CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House over their coverage. The outlets cite constitutional protections and say their reporters were turned away September 19; Trump says they publish false stories.
Role at the time: Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and professor emeritus at UCLA School of Law, in a signed post on the Volokh Conspiracy blog at Reason
Statement summary
In a signed post on the Volokh Conspiracy blog at Reason, law professor Eugene Volokh wrote that, according to the D.C. Circuit, the government may not exclude press outlets based on viewpoint from spaces broadly opened to the press, such as the main White House press briefing room, but may do so from spaces such as Oval Office interviews. He wrote that an exclusion resting on an objective viewpoint-neutral judgment “might be permissible,” while one based in part on disapproval of the three outlets’ perspectives or editorial judgments would likely be seen as viewpoint discrimination.
“But if the exclusion is based in part on disapproval of CNN's, MS NOW's, and Politico's perspectives or editorial judgments as being unfair or unsound, that would likely be seen as viewpoint-discrimination—which, again, is unconstitutional as to the main press briefing room but constitutional as to the Oval Office.”
The case’s fixed reference point is President Trump’s announcement, by Truth Social post at 3:04 PM EDT on Sept. 18, 2026 and reaffirmed in the Oval Office that afternoon, that CNN, MS NOW and Politico are banned from the White House because of their coverage. Volokh’s words neither approve nor reject the announced exclusion: he writes that its constitutionality depends on the space (unconstitutional as to the main press briefing room, constitutional as to the Oval Office) and on whether it rests on a viewpoint-neutral judgment, which “might be permissible,” or on disapproval of the outlets’ perspectives, and he does not say which basis applies here. The closest competing label is condemns, because he says an exclusion based in part on such disapproval would likely be seen as viewpoint discrimination. That loses because the same sentence calls such an exclusion constitutional as to the Oval Office, so his conclusion turns on an express condition rather than rejecting the act.
Statement dates: September 18, 2026
Statement dates: September 18, 2026
Statement dates: September 18, 2026
