The Trump administration recently did something that incensed a good majority of the press corps, but an alarming number of my national colleagues cheered the decision.
That is, for the first time in its history, The Associated Press was kicked out of the president’s regular and spontaneous briefings, and while some of my conservative colleagues say “turnabout is fair play,” I am among those who have a major problem with that action.
Now, before you try to brand me anti-MAGA, I will state that I believe Trump is doing exactly what he said he would do, and I have no major issues with most of his agenda.
It is true that Trump has had to deal with a largely antagonistic press since he first announced his candidacy way back in 2016. Trump has had to deal with outright lies from some members of the press to the degree that if he ran out into traffic to save a child from an oncoming bus, they would accuse him of jaywalking and impeding the flow of traffic.
I get that, but the Trump people need to come to the realization that the Constitution trumps even Trump.
So, what did The Associated Press do to deserve to be kicked out of the regular press pool? They changed their stylebook rules to reflect that the news organization will still use the name Gulf of Mexico while also acknowledging the new name the president has chosen, “Gulf of America.” This is because AP serves news organizations works wide, and the new name is only applicable in the United States.
In my opinion, that is a reasonable style rule, as the people in Spain, the Netherlands, France etc. still refer to the body of water as the “Gulf of Mexico.”
In the past, I have disagreed with some of the AP’s style rules, such as capitalizing “Black people” and “Asian people,” but not capitalizing “White people.” As a writer, I believe if one race is capitalized, then all should be, and once I stated my case to my editor, she eventually agreed.
Really, the whole “Gulf of America” bruhaha, in my opinion, should be trivial to the leader of the free world. However, his message was clear: if you cross me, you will be punished.
This is, unfortunately, not a new trend for the Trump organization. I have witnessed this behavior first hand, and it was troubling to me when it occurred.
When the Trump campaign announced it was opening its Columbia County Office, public invitations went out all over the internet. Naturally, we sent our reporter, Skyler Andrews, to cover the event, which was to include several prominent elected leaders as speakers.
Upon arriving, someone recognized Skyler. The national campaign organizers were told of the presence of media, and he was not only kicked out of the event, but frog-marched out to his car and told to leave the property.
When I spoke to the campaign folks headquartered down in Florida, they absolutely would not back down. Yes, the event was open to the public, they said, but not the “media.”
It concerned me greatly that if they would do that to a small-city newspaper that they would do the same to the national press once they made it to Washington D.C., and they have.
I also found it quite funny to learn that the Trump campaign subscribed to The Augusta Press the next day just to see what response would be published.
Those of us who consider ourselves conservatives know full-well that CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, et.al are not trustworthy outlets when it comes to reporting news about Trump or his administration. NBC news proved their bias once again when they blamed Trump for the recent air crash that happened in Canada.
The Associated Press is quite different. I find them to be fair and accurate most of the time. They might not necessarily be Trump voters, but they understand their responsibilities when it comes to accurate reporting.
Some of my colleagues thought I was a little heavy handed dealing with the Trump people when our reporter was kicked out of a silly ribbon-cutting event; however, I am very firm when it comes to my beliefs regarding the First Amendment.
The press is the only private sector job mentioned in the Constitution, and the language is not vague.
While it is nettlesome to have to deal with people you know are going to twist your words like taffy and tell downright lies, the public has the responsibility to inform themselves on which news outlets are credible and which are biased to the point as to be untrustworthy; the president has no business making that determination for them.
We don’t want to go back to those days in America where the press turned their heads to the fact that other Americans were being placed in internment camps because they didn’t want to anger the president.
In my opinion, the Trump people are only spreading “TDS” by pulling such silly, yet, serious stunts.
Scott Hudson is the Senior Investigative Reporter, Editorial Page Editor and weekly columnist for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
