MS NOW Host Scoffs at the Idea They Were Banned from WH On a Technical Glitch: They ‘Could Have’ Let us In ‘On the Spot’

MS NOW analyst Ayman Mohyeldin argued that the White House “could have” complied with the federal ruling ending its press ban by issuing journalists from the three affected outlets “daily press passes” as he warned against the idea that reporters were turned away due to a “lag” in the system.

Mohyeldin’s take came after MS NOW White House correspondent Laura Barrón-López, a Politico journalist and CNN correspondent Betsy Klein were all turned away from the gates of the White House, and some even had their hard-pass confiscated.

The refusal of entry came after U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly issued a 14-day temporary restraining order overnight, directing White House officials to “immediately return, reinstate, and restore” hard-pass credentials for journalists from the three organizations.

The outlets filed for an emergency court hearing telling Kelly that the White House was refusing to comply with his order. The judge then ordered the Trump administration to address concerns by 12:30pm (ET) on Thursday.

Speaking on MS NOW’s Money Power Politics, contributor Molly Jong-Fast reflected that at that moment it was unclear whether the failure to comply was “incompetence or actual going against the law.”

Mohyeldin expressed skepticism that the issue was a technical one, arguing that the White House could have issued temporary passes if it “wanted to.”

“Look, I don’t have a lot of experience going into the White House, but I do have some. I’ve never been accredited to actually go there on a daily basis,” he said. “But the White House issues daily press passes that you can actually go. So if you get summoned to the White House as a journalist and somebody says, come have a meeting, they can issue you a press pass on the spot. So again, if the White House –”

“Some kind of I’m assuming a background check of some sort, but it’s a pretty expeditious process,” guest host Erielle Reshef said.

“Yeah, it’s a temporary pass, but you can get a pass for the day if the White House wants you to have that pass for the day,” Mohyeldin replied.

He continued: “And so the point that I’m trying to say is, even for people who are vetted for our staff, who I’m sure the White House and the Secret Service know exactly who they are, if they wanted to let them in –”

“It’s a matter of motivation,” Reshef added.

“Exactly, if they wanted to let them in they could have let them in easily, even if a pass is deactivated they could issue them a temporary pass to get them in there to cover this very important summit and say we will get you the hard-pass tomorrow,” the analyst concluded.

Watch above via MS NOW.

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