{"id":559960,"date":"2021-06-10T18:07:49","date_gmt":"2021-06-10T22:07:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=559960"},"modified":"2021-06-10T18:07:51","modified_gmt":"2021-06-10T22:07:51","slug":"not-a-free-press-at-all-6-ways-the-biden-administration-controls-your-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/not-a-free-press-at-all-6-ways-the-biden-administration-controls-your-news\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Not A Free Press At All\u2019: 6 Ways The Biden Administration Controls Your News"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fnot-a-free-press-at-all-6-ways-the-biden-administration-controls-your-news%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=559960&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/GettyImages-1233378115.jpg?w=1200&#038;h=800&#038;ixlib=react-9.0.3\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"  style=\"display:none\"><\/div>\n<p>At the first press briefing of the newly inaugurated administration, White House spokesperson Jen Psaki <a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/white-house-press-secretary-jen-psaki-promises-truth-and-transparency-2021-1\">promised<\/a> the media that she would bring \u201ctruth and transparency back to the briefing room.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In practice, the Biden-Harris administration has shaped, shut down, or censored the news the American people read every day.<\/p>\n<p>Here are six tactics they use:<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Editing quotations<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>To limit reporters\u2019 coverage, the White House regularly edits the very words journalists include in their stories through a practice known as \u201cbackground with quote approval.\u201d Instead of answering reporters\u2019 questions during the daily press briefing, Psaki will send an administration official to circle back with the information the reporter needs, but the reporter has a choice: If you don\u2019t give the administration the right to control the exact wording of the quotation, you can\u2019t quote us. Instead, reporters have to say their information came from an unnamed \u201cadministration official,\u201d which sounds less credible and authoritative.<\/p>\n<p>The agreement also gives the administration veto power over any quotation that it doesn\u2019t like. Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for the New York Times, called the tactic \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/a-pernicious-insidious-awful-practice-how-the-biden-administration-is-editing-our-news\">a pernicious, insidious, awful practice<\/a>\u201d to \u201ccontrol\u201d media coverage.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Slapping \u201cUnprecedented\u201d Gag Orders on Media Outlets<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Presidents have tried to seize reporters\u2019 phone (and later, email) records for decades on the grounds of national security. But it was only during the Biden administration that the media reported that the administration would impose a gag order on the media outlets targeted, banning them from telling the public \u2014 or even their own legal team \u2014 about the maneuver. New York Times\u2019 lawyer David McGraw slammed the Biden Justice Department\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/these-are-the-biden-cages-sen-cruz-posts-shocking-video-of-border-crisis-smugglers\">\u201cunprecedented\u201d gag order<\/a> on the newspaper to \u201cshield [the administration] from public view. How many other gag orders are in effect, we can only guess.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Not holding press conferences<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>The most direct way to shape the news is to stay on message by denying journalists the right to ask questions. This successful strategy began during the 2020 presidential campaign, when Joe Biden \u201ccampaigned\u201d almost exclusively from his basement (\u201cdue to COVID-19\u201d) and regularly called a lid at unusually early hours. The media placidly accepted Biden\u2019s inaccessibility as the price of getting rid of President Donald Trump, and Biden has since made this the norm as president.<\/p>\n<p>The president waited <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/politics\/2021\/03\/25\/what-expect-president-joe-biden-first-press-conference\/6971426002\/\">64 days<\/a> before holding his first press conference \u2014 the longest wait in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wionews.com\/world\/biden-to-hold-first-press-conference-after-breaking-100-year-record-without-one-372963\">100 years<\/a> \u2014 and he <a href=\"https:\/\/www.poynter.org\/newsletters\/2021\/why-hasnt-president-joe-biden-given-more-than-one-real-press-conference\/\">hasn\u2019t held another<\/a> one in the 77 days since. Biden has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/biden-cuts-reporters-questions-short-im-really-going-to-be-in-trouble\">said<\/a> that, if he answers questions at unscheduled times, \u201cI\u2019m really going to be in trouble,\u201d and he\u2019s joked about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/biden-jokes-that-he-will-only-answer-a-reporters-question-on-israel-if-he-gets-to-hit-her-with-a-truck\">running over<\/a> reporters with a truck. The presidential cone of silence is so extreme that even CNN\u2019s Brian Stelter complained to Psaki, asking, \u201cWhy haven\u2019t you held more than one press conference, one big press conference? \u2026 Is that part of an attempt to lower the temperature, be less visible, be boring?\u201d<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Screening reporters\u2019 questions in advance<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Jen Psaki has gone viral with the way she shuts down uncomfortable questions, a tactic her supporters call a \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/search?q=%23psakibomb\">Psaki bomb<\/a>.\u201d But she can prepare those witty retorts, because she has already screened the questions she will ask \u2014 and which ones she will ignore.<\/p>\n<p>Multiple members of the White House press corps <a href=\"https:\/\/f9f88638-e510-4e36-b2f2-4bec5cad460d\/White%20House%20Correspondents'%20Association%20video%20call\">revealed<\/a> that the Biden administration asked them to submit their questions in advance, sharing their concerns during the January 29 video call of the White House Correspondents\u2019 Association. While the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/post-politics\/wp\/2014\/03\/20\/white-house-and-its-reporters-deny-claim-about-submitting-questions-in-advance\/\">Obama<\/a> and Trump administrations did this on occasion, the Biden White House made it a regular practice. A White House spokesperson <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/biden-white-house-asking-reporters-share-questions-advance\">said<\/a> the administration only asked to see the questions in advance in order \u201cto make the daily briefing as useful and informative as possible\u201d and \u201cto understand how the White House can be most helpful in getting them the information they need.\u201d But reporters say this gives the White House the power to dodge uncomfortable questions.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe press can\u2019t really do its job in the briefing room if the White House is picking and choosing the questions they want,\u201d a White House correspondent <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thedailybeast.com\/white-house-reporters-say-biden-team-asked-them-for-questions-in-advance\">told<\/a> The Daily Beast. \u201cThat\u2019s not really a free press at all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Even after reading the questions in advance, Psaki answers an enormous number of questions by promising to \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/lies-ums-and-ill-circle-back-what-we-can-expect-from-jen-psaki\">circle back<\/a>\u201d with the information she already knew reporters needed.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Denying access to vital information<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>After Biden rescinded President Trump\u2019s border enforcement provisions, illegal immigration across the southern border exploded into a crisis. The administration wanted to avoid the photos of \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/with-trump-gone-the-media-no-longer-cares-about-kids-in-cages\">kids in cages<\/a>\u201d which dogged the previous administration \u2014 so Biden simply <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/what-transparency-even-the-leftist-media-is-slamming-the-biden-administration-for-border-blackout\">banned reporters<\/a> from photographing the facilities, or the border.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor the past four presidential administrations, I have accompanied U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents and photographed their encounters with migrants as they enforced immigration policy. No longer,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/outlook\/2021\/03\/22\/journalists-banned-border-facilities-migrants\/\">wrote<\/a> John Moore, a photojournalist who works with Getty Images, in The Washington Post. \u201cWe have gone from the Trump-era \u2018zero tolerance\u2019 policy toward immigrants to a Biden-era \u2018zero access\u2019 policy for journalists covering immigration. This development is unprecedented in modern history.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not merely the media. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/these-are-the-biden-cages-sen-cruz-posts-shocking-video-of-border-crisis-smugglers\">posted video footage<\/a> of an administration official <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/watch-alleged-biden-official-tries-to-block-ted-cruz-from-taking-photos-inside-cbp-facility\">hustling him out<\/a> of a migrant detention facility in Donna, Texas, in March. If you can\u2019t visit the facility, you can\u2019t report on the administration\u2019s interlacing web of failures.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Stonewalling Freedom of Information Act requests<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Investigative journalists regularly file Freedom of Information Act (or \u201cFOIA\u201d) requests for documents about a given topic. The government is legally required to answer promptly and fulfill these inquiries, if possible. But this administration had hardly taken office when it started stonewalling FOIA requests \u2014 a skill Biden <a href=\"http:\/\/therightswriter.com\/2011\/02\/obama-stonewalls-more-proof-of-unequal-justice-for-conservatives\/\">learned<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/joe-biden-stonewalled-foia-request-to-hide-travel-costs\">practiced<\/a> during the Obama administration, when FOIA requests sometimes stretched on for <a href=\"https:\/\/aclj.org\/government-corruption\/judge-in-aclj-foia-case-orders-deep-state-to-produce-for-court-review-jen-psaki-email-regarding-secret-obama-biden-admin-meetings-with-iran\">years<\/a> at a time.<\/p>\n<p>The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) has already had to take the Biden administration to court for refusing to honor at least two of its FOIA requests, about <a href=\"https:\/\/aclj.org\/pro-life\/aclj-files-lawsuit-against-biden-administration-after-its-refusal-to-comply-with-our-foia-regarding-taxpayer-funded-experimentation-with-the-remains-of-aborted-babies\">taxpayer-funded experimentation with aborted babies<\/a>\u2019 bodies and the decision to delete a press release about <a href=\"https:\/\/aclj.org\/immigration\/aclj-files-lawsuit-against-biden-administration-over-refusal-to-comply-with-our-foia-over-border-crisis\">capturing two terrorists<\/a> at the U.S. border, respectively. \u201cUnfortunately, the Biden standard when it comes to the challenges it faces seems to be \u2018ignore it until it goes away.\u2019 We\u2019ve received no cooperation,\u201d the ACLJ noted. \u201cWe will do our part to bring this information to the American people. And then the American people can hold our leaders accountable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>These six tactics \u2014 which are just a few which we happen to know about \u2014 give the administration powerful tools to deny, shape, and even <em>write <\/em>the media\u2019s coverage of the president and vice president. As of this writing, the Biden-Harris administration has held power for a mere 141 days.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s going to be a long, and heavily redacted, four years.<\/p>\n<p><em>The views expressed in this piece are the author\u2019s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><em>The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies and counter-cultural outlets for news, opinion, and entertainment. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a\u00a0<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\"><em>member<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the first press briefing of the newly inaugurated administration, White House spokesperson Jen Psaki promised the media that she would bring \u201ctruth and transparency back to the briefing room.\u201dIn &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2279949,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/GettyImages-1233378115.jpg?w=1200&h=800&ixlib=react-9.0.3","fifu_image_alt":"\u2018Not A Free Press At All\u2019: 6 Ways The Biden Administration Controls Your News","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-559960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/GettyImages-1233378115.jpg?w=1200&h=800&ixlib=react-9.0.3","fifu_image_alt":"\u2018Not A Free Press At All\u2019: 6 Ways The Biden Administration Controls Your News","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2279949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}