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Speaking on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe', NBC's White House correspondent Chuck Todd lamented the White House's approach to press relations on Friday morning, noting how obsessed the Obama administration is with leaks. NBC's Todd, Gregory lament White House's 'controlling' relationship with media

NBC’s White House correspondent Chuck Todd and “Meet the Press” host David Gregory lamented the White House’s approach to press relations on Friday morning, noting how obsessed the Obama administration is with leaks.

Speaking on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Todd said the relationship is a very “controlling” one.

“Just very controlling, I mean, that’s probably the best word to use, okay? And the thing is that I sort of look at this take the long view and I get it that every – I think every White House wants to control their own message and they want to control access and they want to decide what is news and what is not,” Todd said. “But it is amazing to me this White House does get obsessed when something, quote, unquote, ‘leaks.’ They seem to be sometimes more worried about well, who did it, How did this get out? Rather than dealing with the story itself.”

Todd said he thinks the administration believes they aren’t any more or less controlling or secretive than the George W. Bush administration, “and it may be that that is just their perception and not the reality.”

Both Todd and Gregory were responding to comments made Thursday by New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson, who said Obama's White House is “the most secretive” White House she’s ever dealt with.

Gregory said Abramson was specifically talking about the administration prosecuting leakers, which he said was a point of conflict between the White House, the President and the Attorney General.

“[T]hey say look – if there are criminal leaks of classified information, and that is against the law and we got to pursue it,” Gregory said. “I think some of their more progressive sensibilities are offended by that as they’ve tried to steer some middle ground and I don’t think they have been consistent about this.”

Todd also said technology has given the White House the advantage of going around the press in a way no other White House could.

“When you take that, you take the access limitations, you throw in the aggressive prosecution or attempts to prosecute leakers and I think it paints the larger picture that Jill Abramson was trying to paint,” Todd said. “Boy, these guys are controlling and secretive but I would go to your point, they are selectively secretive and I don’t think they are when they think it’s political benefit.”

The question of access has been a long simmering issue between the White House press corps and the administration. Earlier this year, media organizations and associations wrote a letter to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, protesting the White House practice of providing official photographs and videos in lieu of direct press access. Representatives from various media groups also met with White House press staffers to discuss the relationship. Earlier this month, photographers were granted access to the normally private weekly lunch between Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.