‘Can’t hear what the president’s saying’: Trump’s helipad ceremony remarks go unrecorded as major networks boycott pool coverage

On Monday, Donald Trump appeared at a ribbon-cutting for a newly built helipad on the White House South Lawn. Workers in hard hats and bright yellow safety vests stood nearby as he spoke. No members of the press pool were on hand to attach a microphone.

An official White House video stream carried the scene but failed to capture usable audio of his comments. A Marine One helicopter sat idle a short distance away, and its engine noise drowned out nearly everything else. The president’s voice came through as unintelligible.

The New Republic reports that Newsmax was among the outlets that still broadcast the ceremony. Anchor Bianca de la Garza pointed to the muffled feed as “one example” of the president’s censorship scheme “backfiring just a little bit.” She added, “Obviously, the ramifications are right here. Can’t hear what the president’s saying.”

Networks drop pool duty after three outlets lose White House access

Trump said Friday that MS NOW, CNN, and Politico would no longer be allowed into the White House. He labeled the decision as a response to “FAKE NEWS”. “Media Outlets shouldn’t be able to constantly write or report FICTION and LIES when they’re covering the President of the United States, the Trump Administration, or the United States of America. Other Fake News Media Outlets to follow, he wrote on Truth Social. 

Several other news organizations treated the exclusion as a threat to the First Amendment and a slight against the press as a whole. On Monday, the full White House press pool – NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox News among them – stopped covering presidential events until the ban was lifted.

That same day, MS NOW, CNN, and Politico sued Trump and his administration. Their complaint labeled the targeted ban “a blatant violation” of the First Amendment.

Lawyers for the three outlets contended that the Constitution “does not allow a president or any other government official to deprive the press of their First Amendment rights and liberty and property interests with no notice or process based solely on his dislike of the content of their reporting.”

Trump later posted on Truth Social that “the White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish. It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like Cancer in our beloved United States of America.”