Former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner thinks a federal judge may soon have to spell things out for President Donald Trump in the simplest terms possible. The White House appeared to dodge a court order to restore press credentials to reporters from CNN, MS Now and Politico.
U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee, issued an eight-page order around 1:30 a.m. on Sept. 24. It directed the administration to immediately return the credentials Trump had revoked a week earlier. In a new video on his YouTube channel, Kirschner said that when the reporters showed up at the White House later that morning, their passes still hadn't been restored.
Lawyers for the news outlets went back to Kelly, who ordered the Justice Department to respond by 12:30 p.m. DOJ then said the credentials had been reinstated, and the reporters were allowed onto the grounds. But Kirschner said CNN and MS Now reporters were later blocked from the state dinner for Chinese President Xi Jinping.
"This is Donald Trump playing games, unconstitutional games, pretending to comply, pulling back and defying," Kirschner said. He called it viewpoint discrimination, since some reporters were let in and others weren't.
He predicted another court filing within a day and said Kelly "may have to get down into the weeds of telling Donald Trump, like a six-year-old, exactly what he is prohibited from doing."
Kirschner pointed out that Trump has done this before. Courts ruled against him after he pulled Jim Acosta's credentials in 2018, a case Kelly also handled, and Brian Karem's in 2019.
"Three strikes and you ought to be out. Three strikes and you ought to be impeached," he said. "It's coming, sport."
He also went after DOJ attorneys for claiming the move was about national security, an argument Kelly rejected. According to Kirschner, Trump had already said publicly that he pulled the passes because he didn't like the outlets' coverage.
Kirschner added that Xi arrived with Chinese state media, and they got access while the American reporters were shut out.
"Who poses a national security risk to the United States?" the ex-prosecutor asked. "CNN, MS Now, and Politico, or Donald Trump by allowing Chinese propaganda state media coming in and reporting?"
