John Moore/Getty Images Fourth Estate Donald Trump and Jim Acosta, a Love Story The fakest news in town is that the president is mad at a preening TV reporter who’s great for ratings.

Jack Shafer is Politico’s senior media writer.

If CNN reporter Jim Acosta is such a troublous force inside the White House Briefing Room—a “rude, terrible person” as President Donald Trump recently put it—deserving of being banned from White House grounds, then why did Trump and press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders routinely call on him during the televised question and answer periods at the White House over the past 22 months?

Had Acosta’s behavior truly offended them, Sanders and Trump could have permanently stifled the pesky reporter by treating him like a ghost, averting their gazes and picking other reporters during question time. Acosta couldn’t have done anything about it. Instead, Sanders and Trump regularly called on Acosta, counting on the likelihood that he would do that Acosta thing of speechifying and playing microphone hog as he attempts to turn a question into an extended back-and-forth. Sanders and Trump have pretended exasperation at Acosta’s posturing—posturing that hasn’t broken much news, by the way—but not so secretly they happily wallow in his pomposity. By getting Acosta to play the preening, self-aggrandizing, sanctimonious reporter and using him as the punching bag for the White House’s anti-press strategy, Sanders and Trump have created a unique public venue to exhibit their hatred for the “fake news” of CNN.


The TV moments created by Acosta's clashes—see the Guardian's reel of their best sparring matches—have served him, too. If you’re a fan of reporters who are better at lecturing than asking a question and think White House briefings and presidential press conferences should resemble the bloodsport of duels, then you probably find the Acosta clashes sufficiently enriching to make CNN your cable news destination.

Acosta’s forced exile and the lawsuit filed by CNN today demanding that Sanders and Trump return the “hard pass” that will allow him to roam the White House grounds have turned him into a free speech martyr, which I suppose he is. Like all First Amendment radicals, I deplore the Acosta ban and look forward to the day that he’s back in the White House making a pest of himself again. The case law cited in the suit by lawyer Theodore J. Boutrous, a top cock in the First Amendment bar’s pecking order, appears to prevent the White House from arbitrarily banning reporters from White House press facilities “for less than compelling reasons.” Even Fox News Channel’s legal analyst Andrew Napolitano predicts that the matter will be resolved “quickly“ in CNN’s favor.

The original charge Sanders made when barring Acosta—that he had placed “his hands” on the White House intern trying to retrieve his microphone during the presser—has been disproved. Today, attempting to argue against the CNN suit, Sanders shifted her rationale for the de-Acostafication of the White House, accusing him additionally and accurately for not surrendering the microphone when approached by the intern.

But as Sanders herself acknowledges, this was not the first time Acosta had resisted yielding the floor. So where is the common justice in ejecting him from White House grounds without so much as a warning? Sanders and Trump have thrilled in Acosta’s bad manners not only because his acting out helped personify their critique of CNN but also because it has made great TV drama for the president. Anything that’s good for ratings is good with Trump. It’s obvious from viewing the Acosta-Trump faceoff that Trump was spoiling for a fight—“Here we go,” Trump interrupted as Acosta began the wind-up on his first question—and started swinging back from the get-go. He wanted what Acosta was bringing so he could re-assume his old reality-TV role as the heavy who banishes the pretentious upstart. When the CNN lawsuit rolled in today, Trump must have clicked his heels in joy at the prospect of kicking Acosta and CNN around some more.

Televised White House briefings have always been political theater but under Trump’s management they’ve generated as much genuine news as a low-wattage kitchen microwave. The endless bickering between Sanders and the press corps and her obfuscations have become the story, much to the detriment of journalism. I wouldn’t go so far to call the briefings useless—they can connect reporters to otherwise hard-to-find facts and get the administration on the record—but for real news you have to rely on reporters like Maggie Haberman who spend little time in the daily briefings waiting for news to arrive.

Like so many episodes of The Trump Show, the martyrdom of Jim Acosta provides an entertaining sideshow. While it’s true that he’s more of a pain in the neck than a true newshawk, we can still call for his return to the White House briefing room in good conscience because being a pain in the neck is often a necessary part of the job. Besides, Sanders and Trump already miss him.

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Does the briefing room emit low-level radiation like a kitchen microwave or is it more like an afterschool special for shut-ins? Send your metaphor judgment to [email protected]. My email alerts get a congressional press pass every session but almost never uses it. My Twitter feed has never been to the White House and doesn’t want to go. My RSS feed agrees with A.J. Liebling that the freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.