(04-30) 04:00 PDT Washington -- The White House told media outlets Friday that it did not threaten to exclude The Chronicle from pool coverage of events in the Bay Area after the paper posted a video from an event in San Francisco last week, contradicting statements from the paper's editor, Ward Bushee.

Bushee said Friday the White House press office is not telling the truth.

"Sadly, we expected the White House to respond in this manner based on our experiences yesterday," Bushee said in a statement. "It is not a truthful response. It follows a day of off-the-record exchanges required by key people in the White House communications office who told us it would remove our reporter, then threatened retaliation to The Chronicle and Hearst reporters if we reported on the ban, and then recanted to say our reporter might not be removed after all."

Bushee said The Chronicle's report on the matter Friday was accurate. He also asked that the White House issue an on-the-record notice that Chronicle senior political reporter Carla Marinucci remains eligible to be the San Francisco print pool reporter if indeed she has not been excluded.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said The Chronicle "violated the coverage rules that they - and every other media outlet - agreed to as part of joining the press pool for that event. If they thought the rules were too restrictive, they should have raised that at the beginning. However, no reporters have been banned from covering future presidential events and the White House of course would have no problem including any reporter who follows the rules in pool-only events."

The dispute stemmed from a fundraiser held for President Obama April 21 at the St. Regis Hotel in San Francisco. Marinucci was invited by the White House to serve as the local pool reporter to feed information to other members of the press who did not attend.

White House guidelines stipulated that Marinucci was to provide a print report only, but when a protest broke out, Marinucci and other members of the audience filmed it. Marinucci posted the video on the newspaper's website, SFGate.com. The protesters also posted their videos. Marinucci contended that the White House position required her to withhold legitimate coverage and refrain from using newsgathering tools that were available to the public.

The White House Correspondents Association rules allow print reporters to take video and photographs at an event, but are unclear as to whether this permission exists only when television cameras are present. David Jackson, the president of the organization, indicated that he would try to clarify the rules with the White House.

The administration claims frequently that it is the most open in history, but it has had a fractious relationship with the press corps over access to information and restrictions on television cameras at Obama fundraisers.