White House blocks Politico from Air Force One

The White House on Monday will prohibit Politico from boarding Air Force One and fulfilling its pool duties covering President Trump.

Journalists from the outlet will not be allowed on the plane, CNN first reported , meaning there will be no print representative providing reports on the president’s statements and movements for the day.

Politico is one of three news outlets Trump banned from the White House last month, a move that sparked a lawsuit on First Amendment grounds. In response, a federal judge ruled the administration had violated the news organizations’ due process rights.

Journalists for all three outlets, CNN, Politico and MS NOW, were eventually allowed to reenter the White House, but the administration has since sought to keep CNN from carrying out its TV pool duties on two occasions.

The White House did not return a request for comment.

Trump’s initial ban came in connection with what the president said was the outlet’s publishing of “fake news” that he and his attorneys argue put national security at risk.

Some Trump allies have defended the ban, arguing journalists do not have a right to access “special” spaces around the president, like the Oval Office and Air Force One.

Trump last year banned The Associated Press from certain West Wing spaces over the outlet’s refusal to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” in its widely cited stylebook after Trump changed the name.

After CNN was blocked from its TV pool duties last week, an attorney for the outlet asked a judge to rule on the issue of access as it relates to pool coverage of the president specifically.

A hearing in the case is set for Thursday.