A reporter’s relationship with a president who hates him

By Megan Stringer

“It’s a badge of merit,” said Sam Donaldson of the White House correspondent position on CNN this week. But now one correspondent’s press pass has been revoked and some are wondering what makes a White House press correspondent respectable after all?

Donaldson spoke out in support of CNN White House Correspondent Jim Acosta, who this week had his White House press pass suspended by President Donald Trump’s administration. CNN and Acosta are now planning to sue the White House for the suspension.

“If he (the president) can select the reporter, then what is freedom of the press?” Donaldson asked.

It’s a question many are now asking after Acosta was publicly berated by the president at a news conference after the midterm elections. Acosta asked a question about the president’s characterization of a caravan of migrants making their way to the United States, seeking asylum.

In response, President Trump insulted Acosta’s personal moral character, saying he is a “rude, terrible person.” He refused to take a second question from Acosta.

Acosta’s press credentials were suspended by the White House later that evening, along with the explanation that Acosta showed “inappropriate behavior” when a White House aide touched his arm as she tried to take away the microphone from Acosta. (The video shared by the White House has been altered to make Acosta look worse, and in a statement, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said Acosta had placed “his hands on a young woman.”)

However, Acosta’s method of questioning has come under scrutiny as well.

“CNN should be ashamed of itself having you working for them,” President Trump told Acosta live on air. There are many reasons the president might think this. Sure, it might be because he doesn’t like fielding tough questions about his rhetoric and decisions. But the president’s supporters might be wondering if Acosta’s attitude has something to do with it.

It’s Acosta’s rough questioning style that made him a household name, according to The Washington Post. But ABC’s Sam Donaldson was arguably one of the first White House correspondents to tackle that style of question-asking, under a Ronald Reagan Administration. If the president went too long in between press conferences, Donaldson would simply find ways to throw him questions during any public appearance. Now, Donaldson is telling Acosta to “keep it up.”

Acosta has done much the same, but in the face of a different presidency. President Trump does not dodge in silence the way Reagan did, but instead, might come back with a quip attack on the media or a factually incorrect statement. As seen in past encounters, President Trump’s routine response to Acosta’s questions is to simply insult CNN as the “enemy of the people,” rather than provide any sort of answer.

“I’m not going to give you a question. You are fake news,” President Trump once said to Acosta during a news conference about the allegations contained in the Steele dossier, or the private report that alleges connections between President Trump’s campaign and Russian officials.

And indeed, with a president who won’t answer questions even during the prescribed press conference time, it might be time to just shout those questions into the void of the White House, looking for answers anywhere you can get them.

That’s what Donaldson would do.

“The reason we yell at Reagan in the Rose Garden is that’s the only place we see him,” Donaldson told the New York Times in October 1987.

But President Trump isn’t necessarily hiding from the public in the same way Reagan was. The current president is accessible for questions, just not for answers.

So then, what does that badge of honor look like for a White House press correspondent? Acosta has said that comparisons drawn between Donaldson and him gives him the badge of honor that Donaldson had.

But at the end of the day, you can’t just have tough questions to wear a White House press badge of honor. Donaldson found out the way that worked best to get Reagan to answer questions. That’s what reporters do this job for –– get answers, so that people can have them. But if Acosta’s method isn’t delivering answers the same way Donaldson’s did, then maybe it’s time to rethink that method.

Shouting questions into the void might have worked before, but what worked in the past doesn’t always work in the future. As reporters face an increasingly unfriendly White House –– that takes steps to remove press credentials for reporters it doesn’t like –– there’s got to be a new way to ask tough questions. And, most importantly, to get answers.