Updated Sept. 24, 2026, 8:21 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON — A federal judge halted President Donald Trump‘s ban blocking three major media outlets from reporting at the White House, saying the move was probably unconstitutional, and ordered access to be restored.
In an early-morning ruling, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee, issued a temporary restraining order to reinstate press passes for reporters from CNN, MS NOW and Politico, after Trump announced on Sept. 18 that he was banning them from the White House.
In his court order, Kelly blocked officials from enforcing the ban for 14 days and ordered the White House to return and restore White House press passes that were revoked from reporters at the outlets.
“The merits of this claim are assessed in two steps: ‘the first asks whether there exists a liberty or property interest which has been interfered with by the State; the second examines whether the procedures attendant upon that deprivation were constitutionally sufficient,'” Kelly wrote in the order. “Plaintiffs have shown they are likely to succeed at both steps.”
The judge rejected the government’s assertion that the ban was motivated by national security concerns.
“Nothing in the record that predates this suit suggests that the revocation of Plaintiffs’ hard passes was motivated by national security concerns,” Kelly wrote in the order.
Kelly also said he is bound “full stop” by the precedent of the 1977 Sherrill v. Knight case, when a federal appeals court ruled that the White House cannot arbitrarily deny press passes to reporters based on the content of their coverage if the White House has voluntarily opened its doors to media and established facilities for the press.
Trump, who predicted the court would rule against his ban, has already said the Justice Department will appeal the decision.
The news outlets sued after their reporters were denied White House entry on Sept. 19, arguing that Trump violated their constitutional rights to free speech and to a fair process before losing White House access. While the ban blocks the reporters’ ability to access the White House in person, it doesn’t prevent them from continuing to report on the president.
Kelly’s ruling is only temporary, deciding what should happen now while litigation over the ban continues.
The Trump administration has argued in court that access to the White House is a privilege, not a right, and that the targeted outlets pose national security risks because of their reporting on classified and sensitive information.
A lawyer for the media outlets, Theodore J. Boutrous, Jr., characterized that argument at a Sept. 23 hearing as a pretense, noting that Trump’s initial announcement didn’t raise that concern.
It’s not the first time Kelly has overseen a lawsuit dealing with Trump administration efforts to ban a reporter from the White House. In 2018, he ordered the White House to restore then-CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press badge, after it was revoked following a contentious exchange with Trump at a news conference.
Kelly ruled in that case that the administration hadn’t given Acosta a proper chance to be heard over whether he did something that meant he could lose his press pass.
Trump had said on social media that the three outlets “shouldn’t be able to constantly write or report FICTION and LIES,” and Justice Department lawyers had sought to justify the ban on national security grounds.
The three outlets sued Trump and other members of his administration in federal court in Washington on Sept. 21, saying the ban violated the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment protections for free speech and a free press, as well as their due process rights. They requested a temporary restraining order that would immediately reinstate their White House access while their legal challenge plays out.
Contributing: Reuters
