USA Today on Monday joined a growing list of news agencies boycotting the use of official White House photography over what it says is an unprecedented lack of access to the president.
USA Today Deputy Director of Multimedia Andrew Scott said in a memo to staff the publication will not use “handout photos originating from the White House Press Office, except in very extraordinary circumstances.”
USA Today is now one of more than 35 news agencies refusing to use White House photography.
Last Thursday, a coalition of major news organizations including the Associated Press, New York Times, Washington Post, ABC, and CNN protested their photojournalists being locked out of public events in a letter to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney.
“Journalists are routinely being denied the right to photograph or videotape the President while he is performing his official duties,” the letter said. “As surely as if they were placing a hand over a journalist’s camera lens, officials in this administration are blocking the public from having an independent view of important functions of the Executive Branch of government.”
The news organizations say their photographers are barred from “private” events, only to have official White House photographers cover them.
-----
The Times’ David Sanger told Downie the Obama administration is the “most closed, control-freak administration” he has ever covered.
“He’s the least transparent of the seven presidents I’ve covered in terms of how he does his daily business,” ABC News White House correspondent Ann Compton told Downie.
Other reporters described the Obama administration’s “across the board hostility” to press, overblown reactions to stories perceived as negative, and an overwhelming need to control its message.
http://freebeacon.com/newsroom-protests-against-white-house-spread/Control freak seems like a good fit.
