Vice President Mike Pence claims that the Trump administration has "stood strong for a free and independent press" after another turbulent week between the White House and members of the media.
"This administration has stood strong for a free and independent press and defended the freedom of the press on a world stage," the vice president told reporters on Thursday, according to ABC News. Pence was in Singapore at the time for an international summit.
His comments come after Trump and his top officials have faced scrutiny over the revocation of CNN correspondent Jim Acosta's White House press credentials, the latest in a long line of attacks against reporters by a President who takes coverage that is less than fawning as a personal affront.
Acosta's credentials were stripped after an incident during a press conference in which top Trump officials accused him of being physical and "placing his hands" on a White House intern who attempted to take away his microphone. Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders even shared a doctored video of the exchange on Twitter, with the clip edited to make Acosta seem more aggressive.
Later, the White House changed its tune and argued that Acosta's revocation was simply about the president being able to use broad discretion in choosing which reporters are allowed into the White House.
But CNN immediately fired back with a lawsuit against the Trump administration and was joined by other media outlets, perhaps most notably Fox News, which has so far devoted itself to furthering the President's agenda. On Friday a federal judge ruled that the administration had to return the press pass to Acosta. In response, Trump demanded that there be "decorum" from reporters when they are at the White House.
The Trump administration has also been criticized for its handling of the murder of Saudi journalist and Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi. The president has been hesitant to severely punish Saudi Arabia over Khashoggi's death because of the lucrative arms sales deal between the two countries.
And the President himself has often riled his supporters to the point of violence about the media. One of them, Cesar Sayoc, sent a series of pipe bombs to media figures, among others, that the President had singled out, including CNN.
Pence has had a firmer stance on press rights than Trump, though he has never criticized the president openly for his attacks on the media. During the international summit Pence confronted Myanmar for its imprisonment of two Reuters journalists, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo. The two were jailed last December after reporting on massacre of Rohingya Muslims.
During a one-on-one meeting with the Myanmar's leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Pence called the arrest and jailing of the two reporters "deeply troubling" and that "in America, we believe in our democratic institutions and ideals, including a free and independent press."
"There's no comparison whatsoever between disagreements over decorum at the White House and the imprisonment of the two reporters in Myanmar," Pence added, without addressing the President's calls for violence against reporters, and the ways they have been interpreted by his supporters.
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Alexandra Hutzler is currently a staff writer on Newsweek's politics team. Prior to joining Newsweek in summer 2018, she was ... Read more
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