Look at them individually and each skirmish between Number 10 and the media can be viewed as an argument where both sides have a point. But taken together, few in either the media or outside of Downing Street dispute that there is an orchestrated campaign from Johnson’s aides to divide and disrupt their journalist critics — in tactics described as "Trumpian" across the board last week.

Some in Johnson’s administration are strongly opposed to this strategy, fearing that Number 10’s uncompromising behaviour is creating unnecessary enemies and starting fights it will ultimately never win. BuzzFeed News can reveal a deep divide has opened up at the top of government over whether Johnson should order his aides to make peace.

The big picture story is that Johnson ultimately appears to back what his senior team see as a culture war against elements of the British media establishment that they perceive have not only opposed their politics for the last three-and-a-half years, but for decades.

Johnson is determined to exert heavy influence over the decision of who will be the next BBC director-general, preventing the appointment of a liberal-centrist and potentially endorsing a controversial Conservative-leaning political candidate. “The BBC has had a long list of political director-generals, chairmen, and senior executives. Why should we be any different?” a source said.

Number 10 is entirely serious in its plans to decriminalise nonpayment of the licence fee and review Channel 4’s public service broadcasting obligations, as BuzzFeed News revealed during the election.

Senior Tories told BuzzFeed News that they object to licence fee payers’ money being spent on what they see as “woke” BBC comedy programmes, dramas exhibiting liberal biases, and projects such as the online BBC Three. One said Channel 4 News would no longer be allowed to “make a mockery of Ofcom impartiality rules night after night”. Johnson has not forgotten that Channel 4 News’ editor Ben de Pear once liked a tweet calling him a “cunt”.

This is a government that privately cheered Laurence Fox’s incendiary Question Time appearance in which the actor claimed “to call me a white privileged male is to be racist”. Since then, two senior ministers have praised Fox’s comments to BuzzFeed News. “The public are sick of having this crap stuffed down their throats by the media for years. We don’t have to go along with it any more,” one said.

But declaring open warfare on the media has had early “consequences” for Johnson too. The most glaring example came on Brexit night, when Downing Street informed broadcasters that they would not be permitted to film a typical “pool” clip of the prime minister’s address to the nation — where one broadcaster sends in its cameras and then shares the footage with other outlets. Instead, the government would be filming the video and expected the broadcasters to air it on the 10 o’clock news.

Johnson spent hours crafting his speech for his big moment and prerecording it for the Number 10 cameras. But, outraged at the break in convention and the attempt by the government to control the images, BBC and ITV called Downing Street’s bluff and refused to run his video. Senior Tories were apoplectic at that decision, but accepted that their own attempt to bounce the broadcasters into doing what they wanted had badly backfired.

Number 10 is happier with its boycott of the BBC Radio 4’s flagship Today programme. Furious once again at perceived bias, the government banned its ministers from appearing and has received private feedback from some political journalists that they have stopped listening because it no longer breaks news as a result. The BBC was keen to point out this week that the Today audience had increased during the boycott. “The Today stuff is about the Lobby, not the general public,” a government source said.

But other ministers are less keen. Justice secretary Robert Buckland — who has long been at odds with Downing Street over its hardline Brexit strategy before the election — signalled his doubts, telling the BBC, “I love the Today programme. Radio 4 has been my programme of choice for about 30 years.” There was particular unease that, the morning after the Streatham terror attack, a government minister was not put forward for a full broadcast round.

Also boycotted by the government is ITV’s Good Morning Britain, after its host Piers Morgan launched a series of personal attacks on Cain and the Downing Street press secretary Rob Oxley. Johnson and his ministers have instead been put on BBC Breakfast, which has around double the viewers.

Tory sources have said they want to reach the public more via new media and social media, rather than traditional news outlets, ironically echoing Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in his own battles with the press. Johnson has taken part in a regular “People’s PMQs” session on Facebook, where he reads out mostly softball questions from punters. The format has not received universal acclaim. “It is fucking shit,” one Conservative MP told BuzzFeed News.

If you’ve been on Twitter recently you will have struggled to miss the ongoing brawl between Number 10 and Westminster’s political journalists, known collectively as the Lobby. First, the Labour-supporting Daily Mirror newspaper was barred from the Tories’ election battle bus. Then Number 10 decided to move their decades-old Lobby briefings from Parliament to Downing Street — to the fury of journalists who feared they would be on “away territory” and that government spinners would be able to control access. The Society of Editors signed a letter to Johnson urging him to reconsider the changes, with Downing Street still refusing to engage.

Last week, that smouldering row fully ignited as the Lobby staged a walkout in protest at Cain inviting some senior reporters to what Number 10 described as an “inner Lobby” briefing with the prime minister’s Brexit special adviser David Frost, but excluding others. Around 10 journalists were on the list, with five or six from other titles asked to stand on the other side of the room in Downing Street and barred from entering the briefing. All the reporters left when Cain refused to let the uninvited ones in.

It is not out of the ordinary for Number 10 to hold off-the-record briefings for selected journalists, something that happened routinely under Theresa May’s regime. In July 2018, May’s senior aides Gavin Barwell and Robbie Gibb invited reporters and pundits from Tory-sympathising outlets including the Spectator, Conservative Home, Guido Fawkes and the Mail on Sunday to attempt to convince them to support her Chequers plan. The meeting did not go to plan, with one prominent journalist lambasting May’s Brexit proposals then walking out.