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Trump team goes dark on press pack for Obama meeting

In a sign of potentially tense times to come, confusion reigned for the press over who and how they were covering President Barack Obama's meeting on Thursday with President-Elect Donald Trump.

According to the White House and pool reports, there will be a "pool spray" toward the end of the meeting. But it's because of the White House, not Trump, that Trump's traveling pool will also be invited in to watch.

Trump did not allow his traveling press to travel with him on Thursday and entered the White House via the South Lawn, meaning no reporters could watch his arrival.

"We are not being provided any information or access by the Trump transition - they are not even responding to emails from me - so I will forward information that the White House is providing that is of interest," wrote Thursday's pooler (and POLITICO White House correspondent) Edward-Isaac Dovere. "However, we will via the WHCA efforts and the White House get access to the Oval meeting, and I will provide a separate pool report for that and anything additional I can."

Trump never allowed media to travel with him during the campaign, breaking years of tradition. He regularly blacklisted outlets for months at a time and would often call out specific reporters during his rallies, leading to some of them needing protection from police, Secret Service and personal bodyguards hired by their companies.

In an email to White House correspondents and the Trump traveling press pool on Wednesday evening, White House Correspondents' Association president Jeff Mason said the White House had not been getting "a lot of communicaiton back" about press coverage arrangements of Trump and Obama's meeting.

"If Trump advisers are telling their poolers there will be no coverage, that is not correct," Mason wrote. "The transition pool is invited to cover the meeting at 11:30 in the Oval Office with the White House pool. There may some limits on TV and still photographers that overlap, but otherwise both pools will be allowed in."

The Trump campaign is also not sending "read-outs" – the short summaries of Trump's conversations with foreign leaders, another tradition Trump is breaking. Reporters are instead getting those read-outs from the foreign governments themselves.

The Trump campaign has not responded to repeated emails seeking an answer on whether there will be a protective press pool once Trump takes power.