Moore says Trump uses Constitution like a ‘suggestion box’ in banning CNN, Politico, MS NOW reporters from White House

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) on Sunday accused President Trump of using the Constitution as a “suggestion box” with his ban on CNN, Politico and MS NOW reporters covering the White House.

Moore said in an interview on “State of the Union” with CNN’s Dana Bash that Trump “seems to have a real problem” with free speech, voting rights and states’ rights as defined in the Constitution.

“And, again, not even just clearly laid out, that, at the founding of this nation, that the founding fathers of this country found it to be so important that they made things like the freedom of the press and free speech and freedom of assembly so important that they made it the First Amendment, the first thing they wanted to get done in this country,” Moore continued.

The Maryland Democrat added that Trump “continues to use the Constitution like it is a suggestion box simply because he does not like the coverage.”

“And so I would just hope that this administration would spend a little bit of time reading, instead of just talking,” he said.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz defended the president’s decision to ban reporters earlier in the broadcast. He told Bash that the president is “ absolutely within his rights ” to ban the three outlets’ White House reporters from covering him in person.

“I would hope that the media would take a good introspective look at itself and its practices, because it throws things out there and then puts a little baby correction that nobody pays attention to, and it sticks to people like napalm,” Waltz said, later prompting pushback from Bash.

Trump announced the ban via Truth Social on Friday, posting that it went into immediate effect “as a result of their constant ‘reporting’ FAKE NEWS!” He later warned that other outlets could be banned in the future.

CNN, Politico and MS NOW reporters were denied access to the White House grounds on Saturday. All three outlets denounced the ban , and MS NOW said it will “take any and all steps necessary” to protect its reporters’ First Amendment right to report on the president.

Weijia Jiang, former president of the White House Correspondents’ Association and CBS News senior White House correspondent, told Bash that the media’s response to the ban was “not a tantrum by three media outlets because the journalists are upset.”

“This is a restriction of information that we work so tirelessly to gather, to give to the public,” she said. “And an attack on one media organization is an attack on all media organizations because it could be us next. The individual outlets matter less than what the president is trying to do. He is very explicit about it.”