The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division is investigating whether the television networks that make up the White House press pool, ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC and Fox News, violated antitrust law when they suspended their shared coverage of White House events in September. A department spokesperson confirmed the investigation on Saturday, Oct. 10. Nobody has been charged, and no violation has been found. If the matter is litigated, a court decides whether conduct violated the law.
What the Justice Department confirmed
The New York Times first reported the investigation. CBS News and NBC News, two of the five networks involved, then reported a statement from a Justice Department spokesperson, Emily Covington, who gave it to CBS on Saturday.
The statement said that members of the television press pool boycotted covering White House events, that group boycotts among commercial competitors can violate the Sherman Act, and that the Antitrust Division is investigating whether the news organizations violated antitrust law. Outlets reported the statement’s wording slightly differently. The statement as relayed named the television press pool; the five networks are named by the outlets reporting the investigation. CBS News reported that it was not immediately clear how the department applies the Sherman Act to the pool suspension.
The reports do not say whether the inquiry is civil or criminal. Civil investigative demands, which are a civil tool, were reported separately. NBC, citing a Justice Department official, reported that demands were sent on Friday, Oct. 9. Anadolu, citing NBC, and Indian Television and Storyboard18, relaying Reuters, said they went to all five networks. The Reuters report on Yahoo, CBS, USA Today and WJLA did not mention them, and ABC said it had not received formal notification. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said the department had reportedly demanded communications and materials related to the pool, and the Telegraph relayed the New York Times as saying the same. No report gave the scope or deadlines.
What a pool is, and what the law says
The White House television pool is a rotating group of networks that record the president’s public events and travel and share the footage with everyone else. According to NBC News, outlets that rely on that shared feed include C-SPAN, Newsmax, One America News and international broadcasters. According to Reuters, the networks share the cost and rotate the duty. MS NOW reported that print and radio pool coverage continued as normal during the suspension, but that a presidential event was broadcast without pool audio and C-SPAN could not carry it.
The statement named the Sherman Act. Section 1 of that act, according to the statute text, bans contracts, combinations and conspiracies that restrain trade or commerce among the states. The department said group boycotts among commercial competitors can violate the act. Whether a pool suspension fits that description is the question the investigation is meant to examine.
A civil investigative demand is a compulsory pre-lawsuit tool. Under federal law, the attorney general or the head of the Antitrust Division can use one to require a person to hand over documents, answer written questions or give testimony while the department is investigating. It is not a charge and not a finding.
In Associated Press v. United States, decided in 1945, the Supreme Court ruled against the AP, holding that applying the Sherman Act to its membership rules did not violate press freedom. The case concerned membership bylaws, not newsgathering pools.
How the dispute began
The pool suspension came during a dispute over press access to the White House that began Sept. 18.
- Sept. 18: President Trump announced that CNN, MS NOW and Politico were barred from the White House, according to USA Today.
- Sept. 19: Reuters-based reports give this date for the White House blocking reporters from the three outlets and revoking their credentials. CBS’s Sept. 24 account describes reporters turned away on Saturday morning, and White House Press Office letters on Tuesday telling each outlet its hard passes were revoked.
- Sept. 21: The five-network television pool suspended its coverage. The White House schedule no longer listed CNN as primary pooler for the week, according to MS NOW. ABC, CBS, Fox News and NBC declined to replace it. The pool chair’s email tied the suspension to the White House position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties, according to the Associated Press and USA Today. Bryan Boughton of Fox News, the acting pool chair, told members that no replacement pooler would be named, according to MS NOW. The pool later resumed coverage, according to the Associated Press and USA Today. TheWrap put the date at Sept. 25.
- Sept. 23 or 24: In the outlets’ lawsuit over the revocations, Judge Timothy Kelly of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a 14-day temporary restraining order, late Sept. 23 according to WJLA and early Sept. 24 according to CBS. As CBS described the Justice Department’s filing, the administration said the outlets’ coverage threatened national security and breached professionalism and decorum. Kelly found the outlets were likely to succeed at least on their due process claim, which rested on their receiving no prior notice or chance to challenge the revocations, according to CBS and WJLA on Sept. 24. WJLA reported that he found the record did not support that national security motivated the revocations, and CBS described him as skeptical of the national security justification. Credentials were restored on Sept. 24, according to CBS and Reuters. As CBS reported on Sept. 24, Trump said on Truth Social that he would take the case to an appeals court if Kelly ruled against him.
- Oct. 8: After a hearing, Kelly extended the order through Tuesday, Oct. 13, according to CBS, NBC and the Associated Press, and said he expected to rule by then, according to CBS and the Associated Press.
A temporary restraining order is not a final ruling.
On access now, CBS reported on Saturday that the White House still bars CNN and Politico from the Oval Office and Air Force One. TheWrap reported that CNN, Politico and MS NOW are back on White House grounds, while the administration says they have no guaranteed access to specific locations.
It is not known whether the investigation is connected to the credentials lawsuit.
What the networks and the White House said
In a joint statement on Sept. 21, according to the CNN wire report carried by WOWT, the five networks said the public has a vital interest in accurate, independent information about its government and that no administration should restrict a news organization because it objects to its reporting.
On the investigation, NBC reported that CBS, CNN and NBC declined to comment and that Fox News did not immediately respond. The White House did not immediately respond to NBC, and CBS reported no response.
Earlier, in the credentials case, the administration’s position as relayed by CBS and Reuters was that access to the White House is a privilege and not a right.
What others said
Bruce Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said the First Amendment protects news organizations’ coverage decisions. He said the investigation appears to be a pretext for obtaining records about how the networks cover White House events during a ban the president imposed, and described it as a further, more brazen attempt to intimidate journalists, according to NBC and the group’s own statement.
Jose Zamora of the Committee to Protect Journalists wrote on X that the government should not use antitrust investigations to intimidate news outlets that are defending press access.
Seth Stern of the Freedom of the Press Foundation called the investigation baseless, according to Common Dreams, and said defending constitutional rights is not an antitrust matter and that losing the president’s attention is not a competitive harm. Common Dreams also reported, citing remarks to CNN, that Jonathan Kanter, who led the Antitrust Division under President Biden, said the networks’ conduct is nowhere near an antitrust violation and is essentially protected speech, comparable to reporters forming the pool in the first place.
As of Sunday morning, no outside figure defending the investigation and no member of Congress had been quoted in the reports available.
What is not known
It is not known what the civil investigative demands ask for, whether all five networks received them, or how the Justice Department would define the competitive harm or the market involved. It is also not known whether the investigation will lead to any enforcement action. The department has not said.
What happens next
The order restoring the credentials of CNN, MS NOW and Politico runs through Tuesday, Oct. 13. WJLA reported on Sept. 24 that the judge is considering whether to issue a preliminary injunction. Kelly said he expected to rule by Tuesday, according to CBS and the Associated Press, and no later hearing date has been reported.
The investigation has no announced timetable. Any network served with a demand will have to decide how to respond, and the department has not said what it will do with what it receives.