White House restricts reporter access to press secretary, staff’s offices

Journalists will no longer be able to access the offices of senior press officials at the White House in Washington, D.C., in a sharp break with tradition announced by Trump administration officials on Oct. 31, 2025.

The New York Times reported that for decades, White House correspondents have been permitted to roam through an area of the West Wing known as “Upper Press,” which houses the offices of the press secretary and other senior press aides. This access enabled reporters to ask impromptu questions outside of press briefings and keep up with breaking news events.

A White House memorandum released Oct. 31 announced the end of this practice, prohibiting journalists from accessing Upper Press without a prior appointment, citing security concerns with staffers now handling National Security Council materials.

“This policy will ensure adherence to best practices pertaining to access to sensitive material,” the memo stated. Reporters will still have access to a separate office area adjacent to the briefing room, known as “Lower Press,” where lower-level communications staff are located.

Communications Director Steven Cheung justified the restrictions in a social media post, claiming that reporters have surreptitiously recorded video and audio of the West Wing offices, entered restricted areas and eavesdropped on private meetings.

The White House Correspondents’ Association condemned the heightened constraints.

“The new restrictions hinder the press corps’ ability to question officials, ensure transparency, and hold the government accountable, to the detriment of the American public,” Weijia Jiang, the association’s president, wrote.

The move is the latest in the administration’s ongoing effort to curtail newsgathering activities at the White House and to punish news outlets for coverage that it deems unfavorable.

The Associated Press and The Wall Street Journal have faced direct exclusion in retaliation for their reporting, and wire services were collectively left out of the press pool for President Donald Trump’s trip to the Middle East in May, a first since the White House press corps started traveling with American presidents abroad, according to the correspondents’ association.

The White House also wrested control of the presidential press pool from the organization, and used that authority to censor two pool reports and remove the permanent wire service seat from the pool.

In recent weeks, Trump has floated further restrictions on media access to the White House, suggesting that the press could be moved “very easily across the street.” He had also briefly entertained that possibility ahead of his inauguration in 2017, and under his first administration all but halted press briefings and suspended multiple correspondents’ press credentials.