Ted Boutrous Jr.: “Today was a Feel-Good Moment for the First Amendment”
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Hi there, everyone. In the battle of the press versus Donald Trump, the press has won round one. Reporters from CNN, Politico, and our own outlet, MS Now, are back reporting inside the White House today after a judge blocked Trump's efforts to ban them from the White House grounds. He is a lawyer who's been at the forefront of some of the biggest history-making legal. battles of the last few years. We had a wide-ranging conversation on what comes next in the case and the broader fight to protect the freedom of the press. I'm going to share it with you all on the podcast. So this is the best people and this is Ted Boutros Jr. Thank you so much for being here.
Thanks for having me, Nicole.
And thank you for what you do. I mean, thank you for protecting our right to do this. I I wonder if with your vast experience you could tell us how this case and this battle compares to previous ones. We've had Jim Acosta on all week since this has happened, and that seems like the right parallel. But in a lot of ways this was a lot more journalism at stake, a lot more journalists and a lot more outlets.
It well, it was very gratifying to represent journalists in the press because you're really representing the public too. So I'm glad so glad to be involved in this case. This really is the Acosta case times at least 78, because we had 78 journalists whose hard passes were taken away for with no notice based on the content of their reporting, plus three major news organizations banished from the White House complex. So it's
What was the significance of the judge’s order restoring White House press access?
Like nothing we've ever seen before. And in Jim Acosta's case, they weren't as explicit that they were doing it because the president didn't like the reporting. And here, that was the basis.
And Judge Kelly got it exactly right. So we're very pleased with that order.
What is the sort of after the fact attempt to wrap this or cloak this in national security concerns portend? What does that say to you that they might do next?
They're going to try to come up with some rationale. National security was their first stab. I imagine they'll keep pushing that as we go to the next stage of this litigation, the preliminary injunction stage, and try to flesh it out somehow. But it'll be impossible for them to do it because the president over and over again stated that the reason for this ban was his antipathy towards the content of the the reporting and the view editorial viewpoints. of the networks and politico and the the journalists. So I think it's going to be very difficult for them, but but they the President Trump and the administration have been invoking national security over and over again to try to justify actions. But as Judge Kelly said, there there has to be evidence.
There has to be proof and this is what uh the courts call the a classic post hoc rationalization, a pretext. This wasn't about national security. And I made the point yesterday in the hearing Journalism about national security is really one of the most important types of journalism because it's allowing the people and the press to hold government officials accountable on one of the most important things to the country, and that's national security war and and those sorts of things. So I don't think it's gonna fly. I don't it just it's contrary to the record.
I know you are laser focused on on the clients in the case, but do you ever step back and and have any sort of oh my god moments that this is happening in America?
I do. I I really can't believe it because one of the rationales in the government's brief that they filed basically was that there shouldn't be a free press, that journalists shouldn't be able to gather information about the government, that the government doesn't want to see the light of day, they shouldn't be able to write critical stories.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–2:08
2
What was the significance of the judge’s order restoring White House press access?
2:08–7:14
3
How does this case compare to the Jim Acosta press‑badge fight?
7:14–11:34
4
Why is the government’s national‑security justification considered a pretext?
11:34–16:35
5
What made the moment of reporters returning to the White House feel‑good for democracy?
16:35–19:39
Speakers
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