Press Freedom and Presidential Authority

Thank you. Mayor, to you first, what's your response to President Trump

banning

outlets from the White House grounds?

Uh, did you challenge him at all about this in

your meeting with him?

Historians and legal scholars have called it textbook authoritarianism. And Mr.

President, are you banning outlets like MSNBC now

CNN and, uh, Politico in order to distract

from the Iran war and high gas prices?

Yeah, I, I, I told the president, uh, that we're gonna have all of the members

of

the press here on the lawn, and that is something that I believe in is,

is everyone, no matter the opinion or the critique, that we engage. And Mr.

President.

Yeah, it's interesting because, uh, they said w- they were gonna boycott me,

but they never boycott me, so I wasn't very worried about that.

Look at all that press. But, uh, no, I'm not...

I'm only doing it because

I think the press also has an obligation.

And, you know, I won in a landslide. I won the election in a landslide.

I've done great things. I've done a lot of great things.

I've settled eight wars.

We have the best economic numbers for the country in the history of our country.

We have $21 trillion pouring in, the biggest number ever.

Any country was three. Nobody's ever done what we've done.

I never get anything positive. It's always negative.

Uh, even having to do with the war, we've done so well.

We have tot- look, they're not gonna have a nuclear weapon.

Let me just put it that way. And they're not doing well.

They're not doing...

In fact, I have meetings on it today. They're, they're doing very poorly.

Uh, you would think that an outlet would write at least

reasonably well, but never. If you look at CNN, it's fake news.

If you look at MSNBC now, I don't even know what MSNBC now is.

I guess it's the MSNBC, what it used to be, or

MSDNC, as some people call it. That's Democrat National Committee.

But it's just biased news. And I think that these outlets have an

obligation to be fair. And if they're fake news,

I really think I have an

obligation not to allow them into another very special house.

This is a special house, Gracie Mansion.

Well, the White House is the most special of all houses,

I have to say, and I don't

even think the mayor would argue with that.

And I think I have an obligation not to let fake news.

They're very bad for the country, very bad for national security.

So I have that obligation. So we'll see how it works out.

Thank you. That's all the time the president has.

Thank you all so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Can you talk about keeping-