Donald Trump on Monday said he is revoking the press credentials of The Washington Post, one of the nation’s largest newspapers, over its “dishonest reporting.”
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee made the announcement in a brief post on Facebook Monday afternoon.
{mosads}“Based on the incredibly inaccurate coverage and reporting of the record setting Trump campaign, we are hereby revoking the press credentials of the phony and dishonest Washington Post,” Trump wrote.
In an earlier message, Trump slammed the Post for its coverage of his comments Monday morning about the mass shooting in Orlando, Fla., on Sunday. In those remarks, Trump questioned President Obama’s commitment to fighting Islamic terrorism.
“We’re led by a man that either is not tough, not smart, or he’s got something else in mind,” the presumptive Republican presidential nominee said during a phone interview on “Fox and Friends.”
“And the something else in mind, you know, people can’t believe it, people cannot believe that President Obama is acting the way he acts and can’t even mention the words ‘radical Islamic terrorism,’ ” he said. “There’s something going on — it’s inconceivable. There’s something going on.
“He doesn’t get it, or he gets it better than anybody understands. It’s one or the other, and either one is unacceptable”
Trump wrote that “I am no fan of President Obama, but to show you how dishonest the phony Washington Post is, they wrote, ‘Donald Trump suggests President Obama was involved with Orlando shooting’ as their headline. Sad!”
The headline on the Post story has since been changed to, “Donald Trump seems to connect President Obama to Orlando shooting.”
It’s far from the first time the Trump campaign has tangled with the media. Foreign correspondents have repeatedly accused the campaign of denying their credentials, while reporters from outlets including Buzzfeed, The New York Times and Politico, have been denied entry to Trump campaign events.
But while those individual reporters have been punished by the campaign, this marks the first time a news organization has been banned in its entirely from covering the campaign. Trump has regularly sat for interviews with the Post, specifically with reporter Robert Costa, so it’s unclear how long this ban will last.
CNN’s Jake Tapper noted that other papers had the same takeaway from Trump’s interview on Fox News that sparked the Post story.
“The interpretation from the reliably pro-Trump New York Post was the following: ‘Trump maybe Obama sympathizes with the terrorists.’ That can’t be, though, right?” Tapper asked.
“If Mr. Trump was not suggesting what so many folks, including his fans, thought he was, he should probably clarify it because an accusation by a major party nominee that an American president sympathizes with these religious fanatics who bring nothing but hatred and death throughout the world and killed, in cold blood, 49 innocent people just a few hours ago in Orlando, well, that accusation would be ridiculous and, frankly, truly offensive,” Tapper said.
Trump has regularly shown distaste for The Washington Post, specifically its owner, Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame. The most recent round came after Bob Woodward, the famed Post reporter, said the paper has assigned about 20 people to investigate the life of the now-presumptive GOP nominee.
Those comments came last month. Soon after, Trump bashed the paper as a “toy” used by Bezos “for power so that the politicians in Washington don’t tax Amazon like they should be taxed.” He also accused Amazon of having a “huge antitrust problem.”
Martin Baron, the Post’s executive editor, bashed Trump’s decision in a statement, according to NBC.
“Donald Trump’s decision to revoke The Washington Post’s press credentials is nothing less than a repudiation of the role of a free and independent press. When coverage doesn’t correspond to what the candidate wants it to be, then a news organization is banished,” he said.
“The Post will continue to cover Donald Trump as it has all along–honorably, honestly, accurately, energetically, and unflinchingly. We’re proud of our coverage and we’re going to keep at it.”
Updated at 5:35 p.m.
