CBS News this week got a first-hand look at El Salvador’s notorious Center for the Confinement of Terrorism, a prison that could soon house deportees (and possibly US citizens) from the U.S. The Trump Administration is working on a deal even if it violates human rights. The images are disturbing.
Esta semana, CBS News pudo ver de primera mano el notorio Centro para el Confinamiento del Terrorismo de El Salvador, una prisión que pronto podría albergar a deportados (y posiblemente ciudadanos estadounidenses) de los EE. UU. La Administración Trump está trabajando en un acuerdo, incluso si viola los derechos humanos. Las imágenes son inquietantes.
A widening gulf has opened between the Trump administration and the Associated Press.
Which gulf?
Precisely.
On Tuesday, the AP said the White House blocked one of its reporters from attending an event in the Oval Office because the outlet continues to use the name Gulf of Mexico in its reporting. This, despite President Donald Trump’s recent executive order renaming it the Gulf of America.
After Trump signed that order, the AP announced it would continue referring to the gulf by its original name “while acknowledging the new name Trump has chosen.” It did so in part because the gulf borders other countries that don’t recognize the name change. (The AP did update its Stylebook to reflect Trump’s separate decision to revert the name of North America’s highest mountain, which President Obama changed to the native moniker Denali, to Mount McKinley because that “area lies solely in the United States.”)
In a Wednesday briefing, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the AP’s allegations:
I was very up front in my briefing on day one that if we feel that there are lies being pushed by outlets in this room, we are going to hold those lies accountable. And it is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America.
The standoff continues — and has escalated beyond Oval Office events. Last night, the White House blocked the AP from an open press conference featuring Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
FIRE issued a statement condemning the administration’s actions, which have drawn criticism from press freedom groups, pundits, and politicians across the political spectrum.
In a letter to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, AP Executive Editor Julie Pace called the administration’s actions “viewpoint discrimination based on a news organization’s editorial choices and a clear violation of the First Amendment.”
She’s right.
To be sure, the First Amendment does not require the White House to open its doors to the media or hold press conferences. Nor does the president have to do a one-on-one interview with CNN just because he did one with Fox News. But courtdecisionsspanningdecades make clear that once the government grants media access, it has to play by constitutional rules.
That doesn’t mean the White House has to allow every reporter in the world into the Oval Office or briefing room. Space constraints obviously make that impossible, and not every journalist will manage to secure a press pass. But the reason for denying access matters. When the government shuts out journalists explicitly because it dislikes their reporting or political views, that violates the First Amendment.
As one federal court proclaimed, “Neither the courts nor any other branch of the government can be allowed to affect the content or tenor of the news by choreographing which news organizations have access to relevant information.”
And because denying press access involves the potential deprivation of First Amendment rights, any decision about who’s in or out must also satisfy due process. That means the government must establish clear, impartial criteria and procedures, and reporters must receive notice of why they were denied access and have a fair opportunity to challenge that decision.
The AP — a major news agency that produces and distributes reports to thousands of newspapers, radio stations, and TV broadcasters around the world — has had long-standing access to the White House. It is now losing that access because its exercise of editorial discretion doesn’t align with the administration’s preferred messaging.
That’s viewpoint discrimination, and it’s unconstitutional.
This isn’t the first time the White House has sent a journalist packing for reporting critically, asking tough questions, or failing to toe the government line. During Trump’s first term, the White House suspended CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press pass after he interrogated the president about his views on immigration. After the network sued, a federal court ordered the administration to restore Acosta’s pass.
But court decisions spanning decades make clear that once the government grants media access, it has to play by constitutional rules.
Democratic administrations have also unacceptably targeted disfavored outlets for exclusion. The Obama administration tried to exclude Fox News from a press pool because of displeasure with its coverage. Obama’s deputy press secretary Josh Earnest said at the time, “We’ve demonstrated our willingness and ability to exclude Fox News from significant interviews.”
Similar attacks on press freedom happen at all levels of government. In 2022, FIRE filed an amicus curiae — “friend of the court” — brief in a First Amendment lawsuit challenging vague and arbitrary press pass rules that Arizona elections officials used to block a Gateway Pundit journalist from press conferences. The officials didn’t like the conservative journalist’s political views or negative coverage, including his “inflammatory and/or accusatory language.” After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit initially ruled in favor of The Gateway Pundit, the outlet received a $175,000 settlement.
The current spat over naming conventions for a body of water may seem trivial. But it sends a chilling message to all journalists that White House access hinges on whether the president approves of their reporting. Left unchecked, such a precedent opens the door to broader efforts to manipulate public discourse and undermine press freedom. What other “lies” might the Trump administration hold media outlets “accountable” for? Could scrutiny of its immigration policies, economic performance, or claims about election integrity be next?
The characterization of the AP’s editorial style choice as a “lie” shows the danger of empowering the state to police mis- or disinformation. The Chinese government might say the same about anyone who calls a certain territory “Taiwan” instead of the “Republic of China” or “Chinese Taipei.” To a government official with a misinformation hammer, every deviation from official messaging looks like a nail. We saw enough misguided attempts to police “misinformation” during the Biden administration. Let’s leave that behind.
In an executive order signed the same day as the one renaming the gulf, Trump promised to “ensure that no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.” That’s a good policy, and the administration should stick to it — the First Amendment requires no less.
Any government attempt to control the flow of information strikes a blow at the First Amendment. A free press performs a vital democratic function — gathering, curating, and delivering information, which we can then evaluate for ourselves. Without the Fourth Estate acting as a crucial check on government power, we’ll know less about what our elected officials are up to, and face greater difficulty holding them accountable.
The beauty of this country’s ideologically diverse media landscape is that if you distrust a particular source, countless others are available offering different information and perspectives. Preserving this rich information ecosystem demands constant vigilance against any threats to free speech and a free press, regardless of who the target is. The alternative — no matter what name you give it — is censorship.
This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.
Dive Brief:
The House Committee on Education and Workforce voted Wednesday to advance a bill that would require colleges to report gifts and contracts valued at $50,000 or more from most foreign countries.
That would lower the requirement from the current threshold of $250,000. Republicans argued that the bill, called the Deterrent Act, is needed to prevent foreign influence in higher education.
The bill would also lower the reporting threshold to $0 for the “countries of concern” as determined by the U.S. Code or the secretary of education, which include China, Russia, Iran and North Korea. The proposal would bar colleges from entering into contracts with those countries unless the secretary of education issues them a waiver and renews it each year.
Dive Insight:
The Deterrent Act would amend Section 117 of the Higher Education Act, which oversees foreign gift and contract reporting requirements for colleges. Republicans on the education committee argued the measure is needed to provide more transparency.
A fact sheet on the bill included concerns about foreign adversaries stealing secrets from American universities and influencing student behavior.
The fact sheet also referenced a 2024 congressional report that accused two high-profile research institutions — University of California, Berkeley and Georgia Institute of Technology — of failing to meet the current reporting requirements through their partnerships with Chinese universities.
“Higher education is one of the jewels of American society,” said Rep. Michael Baumgartner, a Washington Republican who co-sponsored the bill, on Wednesday. “Unfortunately, it’s also an area that is often under attack and used by malign influences to subvert American interests.”
Under the bill, colleges would face fines and the loss of their Title IV federal student aid funding if they didn’t comply with the reporting requirements.
Democrats largely voiced opposition to the measure.
However, they focused many of their complaints Wednesday on the Trump administration’s recent moves that have sparked outcry in the higher education sector,including cuts to the National Institutes of Health’sfunding for indirect research costs. A judge temporarily blocked the cuts earlier this week.
“I understand and I do appreciate the intent behind the Deterrent Act, but if House Republicans and the president truly want to lead in America, and they want America to lead, they must permanently reverse the cuts to the National Institutes of Health,” said Rep. Lucy McBath, a Democrat from Georgia. “It’s not enough for us just to wait outside for the lawsuits to protect folks back home from damaging and possibly illegal orders like these.”
Virginia Rep. Bobby Scott, the top-ranking Democrat on the committee, struck a similar tone, referencing the Trump administration’s goal of eliminating the U.S. Department of Education.
He noted that the authors of Project 2025 — a wide-ranging conservative policy blueprint for the Republican administration — aim to dismantle the Education Department with the stated goal of having the federal government be less involved in schools.
“The argument rests on the perception that the federal government is too involved in our schools, and here we are marking up bills that would give the Department of Education more responsibility to impose unfunded mandates and interfere with local schools,” Scott said.
The House committee advanced several other bills Wednesday, including those that would allow schools to serve whole milk and aim to end Chinese influence in K-12 education.
House lawmakers previously passed the Deterrent Act in 2023, though it was never put to a vote in the Senate.At the time, the American Council on Education and other higher ed groups opposed the bill, objecting in part to the large fines colleges could face for noncompliance.
The Republican-backed bill may face better odds in this congressional session, now that the GOP also controls the Senate and the White House.
This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.
WASHINGTON — Democratic members of the House were blocked from entering the U.S. Department of Education’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., Friday after requesting a meeting with Acting Education Secretary Denise Carter to discuss their opposition to the Trump administration’s efforts to limit department programming.
About 18 members of Congress walked up to the visitor’s entrance asking to enter after holding a press conference about their concerns. A person who was not wearing a security uniform came outside and told the group they were not allowed to enter. For the next 30 minutes, lawmakers pleaded to be let in the building, with some holding up their congressional business cards and arguing they had a right to enter the federal building as legislators who oversee federal agencies.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security uniformed officers could be seen inside the glass doors.
“Each and everyone one of us have been through these doors,” said Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, standing near a sign reading “All Access Entrance.” “But, of course, as soon as we get word that Elon Musk and Donald Trump want to shut down the Department of Education, suddenly, they don’t want to let members of Congress in that ask questions.”
On Wednesday, 96 Democratic members of Congress sent a letter to Carter requesting an “urgent” meeting to discuss the Trump administration’s plans for what they say is to “illegally dismantle or drastically reduce” the Education Department. The department has received the letter, but no meeting has been scheduled as of Friday afternoon, according to the office of Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif.
An Education Department spokesperson said in an email after the lawmakers’ visit that “The protest was organized by members of Congress who were exercising their First Amendment rights, which they are at liberty to do. They did not have any scheduled appointments, and the protest has since ended.”
Democratic members of the U.S. House are denied entry to the U.S. Department of Education’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 7, 2025. They were there to voice concerns about attempts to reduce or eliminate department programs.
Kara Arundel/K-12 Dive
Carter, who is an Education Department senior official overseeing federal student aid, is in the acting role as education secretary pending Senate approval of Trump’s choice for education secretary — Linda McMahon. McMahon’s confirmation hearing is scheduled for Feb. 13.
Trump is expected to issue an executive order limiting the Education Department’s activities, although the timing of that order is unknown. Since being inaugurated Jan. 20, Trump has issued a series of executive orders geared toward education. They include restrictions on diversity, equity and inclusion programs, an expansion of school choice, and halting federal support for “gender ideology and discriminatory equity ideology.”
Most recently, he ordered K-12 schools and colleges to prevent transgender girls and women from participating on sports teams that align with their gender identity. Those that don’t comply could lose their federal funding.
Trump has said his goal is to close the Education Department. However, that would require approval from at least 60 members of the Senate. Supporters of shrinking or eliminating the Education Department say there is too much federal bureaucracy. They also say states and districts should have more control over how to spend federal funds for schools.
During the Friday press conference in front of the Education Department, Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-Conn., a former national teacher of the year, asked what would happen to the civil rights of 49 million students, including 7 million students with disabilities, if the Education Department shuts down. She also asked about the $1.6 trillion in student financial aid the department manages.
“If you want to have some true oversight of the department, I’m here for it, but what you will not do is shut down this department and deny access to all of those children who need it while we’re in Congress,” Hayes said.
Another former educator turned lawmaker, Rep. John Mannion, D-N.Y., said, “When we’re talking about dismantling the Department of Education, what we’re talking about is larger class sizes, those kids not getting those individualized services, the removal of athletics, art, science, music.”
“These people and I will not stand here silently as they steal taxpayer dollars from special education students,” Mannion said.
Democratic lawmakers this week have also tried to enter the Washington, D.C., offices of the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Agency for International Development without success, according to statements from lawmakers and news reports.
Also on Thursday, Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., ranking member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, asked the Government Accountability Office to immediately assess the security of IT systems at the Education Department, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services following reports that the temporary Department of Government Efficiency, which is headed by billionaire Elon Musk, has accessed data from various government agencies.
Democratic leaders in Congress sent Carter a letter Wednesday asking about DOGE’s involvement in Education Department’s internal systems that contain personally identifiable information.
This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.
WASHINGTON — Democratic members of the House were blocked from entering the U.S. Department of Education’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., Friday after requesting a meeting with Acting Education Secretary Denise Carter to discuss their opposition to the Trump administration’s efforts to limit department programming.
About 18 members of Congress walked up to the visitor’s entrance asking to enter after holding a press conference about their concerns. A person who was not wearing a security uniform came outside and told the group they were not allowed to enter. For the next 30 minutes, lawmakers pleaded to be let in the building, with some holding up their congressional business cards and arguing they had a right to enter the federal building as legislators who oversee federal agencies.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security uniformed officers could be seen inside the glass doors.
“Each and everyone one of us have been through these doors,” said Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, standing near a sign reading “All Access Entrance.” “But, of course, as soon as we get word that Elon Musk and Donald Trump want to shut down the Department of Education, suddenly, they don’t want to let members of Congress in that ask questions.”
On Wednesday, 96 Democratic members of Congress sent a letter to Carter requesting an “urgent” meeting to discuss the Trump administration’s plans for what they say is to “illegally dismantle or drastically reduce” the Education Department. The department has received the letter, but no meeting has been scheduled as of Friday afternoon, according to the office of Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif.
An Education Department spokesperson said in an email after the lawmakers’ visit that “The protest was organized by members of Congress who were exercising their First Amendment rights, which they are at liberty to do. They did not have any scheduled appointments, and the protest has since ended.”
Democratic members of the U.S. House are denied entry to the Education Department’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 7, 2025. They were there to voice concerns about attempts to reduce or eliminate department programs.
Kara Arundel/K-12 Dive
Carter, who is an Education Department senior official overseeing federal student aid, is in the acting role as education secretary pending Senate approval of Trump’s choice for education secretary — Linda McMahon. McMahon’s confirmation hearing is scheduled for Feb. 13.
Trump is expected to issue an executive order limiting the Education Department’s activities, although the timing of that order is unknown. Since being inaugurated Jan. 20, Trump has issued a series of executive orders geared toward education. They include restrictions on diversity, equity and inclusion programs, an expansion of school choice, and halting federal support for “gender ideology and discriminatory equity ideology.”
Most recently, he ordered K-12 schools and colleges to prevent transgender girls and women from participating on sports teams that align with their gender identity. Those that don’t comply could lose their federal funding.
Trump has said his goal is to close the Education Department. However, that would require approval from at least 60 members of the Senate. Supporters of shrinking or eliminating the Education Department say there is too much federal bureaucracy. They also say states and districts should have more control over how to spend federal funds for schools.
During the Friday press conference in front of the Education Department, Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-Conn., a former national teacher of the year, asked what would happen to the civil rights of 49 million students, including 7 million students with disabilities, if the Education Department shuts down. She also asked about the $1.6 trillion in student financial aid the department manages.
“If you want to have some true oversight of the department, I’m here for it, but what you will not do is shut down this department and deny access to all of those children who need it while we’re in Congress,” Hayes said.
Another former educator turned lawmaker, Rep. John Mannion, D-N.Y., said, “When we’re talking about dismantling the Department of Education, what we’re talking about is larger class sizes, those kids not getting those individualized services, the removal of athletics, art, science, music.”
“These people and I will not stand here silently as they steal taxpayer dollars from special education students,” Mannion said.
Democratic lawmakers this week have also tried to enter the Washington, D.C., offices of the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Agency for International Development without success, according to statements from lawmakers and news reports.
Also on Thursday, Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., ranking member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, asked the Government Accountability Office to immediately assess the security of IT systems at the Education Department, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services following reports that the temporary Department of Government Efficiency, which is headed by billionaire Elon Musk, has accessed data from various government agencies.
Democratic leaders in Congress sent Carter a letter Wednesday asking about DOGE’s involvement in Education Department’s internal systems that contain personally identifiable information.
Representative Greg Steube, a Florida Republican, speaks at a press conference following the passage of his Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act in the House of Representatives.
Allison Robbert/AFP via Getty Images
The House of Representatives voted 218 to 206 to pass a bill that would unilaterally ban trans women from competing in women’s sports Tuesday. The votes were nearly split along party lines, but two Democrats, Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, both from Texas, voted for the bill.
Sponsored by Representative Greg Steube, a Florida Republican, the legislation dubbed the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, is the latest attempt in Congress to keep trans women off women’s sports teams and builds on efforts in the states to restrict the participation of transgender students in sports that align with their gender identity. Last Congress, identical legislation from Steube passed the House but didn’t move forward in the Democratic-controlled Senate.
Now, Republicans hold the majority in both the House and the Senate, making it far more likely that this iteration will be more successful. In nearly half of the country, trans women are banned from playing women’s sports at the K-12 or higher education level, but the legislation would take those bans nationwide.
Passing the bill was a top priority for House Republican leadership, who included it on a list of 12 pieces of legislation to be considered first when the new session of Congress kicked off earlier this month. Its place of prominence seems to indicate that Republican leadership will prioritize rolling back or restricting the rights of transgender people, whom Republicans have often put at the center of a culture war.
Republicans and President-elect Donald Trump have criticized the Biden administration’s effort to amend Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 to prevent blanket bans that prohibit transgender students from participating in sports consistent with their gender identity. Last month, the Biden administration scrapped that proposal.
Under the bill, institutions that receive federal funding would be prohibited from allowing “a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designated for women or girls.” It defines sex as being based on “a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth,” though it doesn’t expound upon how an institution would tell. The bill does not prevent trans men from playing on men’s teams.
Anti-trans activists argue that allowing individuals assigned male at birth to play on women’s sports teams opens cis women athletes up to being injured by athletes who are more naturally powerful due to their physiques. There is sparse research on if this is true; however, the few studies that do exist haven’t backed up the idea that trans women retain significant advantage over athletes assigned female at birth.
Supporters of the legislation—including some cis female athletes, like Riley Gaines, who have competed alongside and against trans athletes at the collegiate level—also argue that trans women take spots on women’s teams, going against Title IX’s promise of equal opportunity, and that it is uncomfortable for cisgender female athletes to share close quarters, like locker rooms, with individuals assigned male at birth.
Representative Tim Walberg, the Michigan Republican who chairs the House Education and the Workforce Committee, echoed these sentiments in his argument on the House floor Tuesday.
“Mr. Speaker, kicking girls off sports teams to make way for a biological male takes opportunities away from these girls,” he said. “This means fewer college scholarships and fewer opportunities for girls. It also makes them second-class citizens in their own sports and puts their safety at risk.”
Some people who agree that trans women should not play on women’s teams say they broadly support transgender individuals but see it as unfair for them to take spots on women’s teams. But Steube took a different approach. When he announced the bill earlier this month, he quoted President-elect Donald Trump’s promise that “under the Trump administration, it will be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders—male and female.”
Meanwhile, Democrats and LGBTQ+ advocates argue that trans women should have the opportunity to play sports—which have been shown to improve outcomes and mental health for youths across the board—on the team that matches their gender.
“Transgender students—like all students—they deserve the same opportunity as their peers to learn teamwork, to find belonging and to grow into well-rounded adults through sports,” said Representative Suzanne Bonamici, an Oregon Democrat, on the House floor. “Childhood and adolescence are important times for growth and development, and sports help students form healthy habits and develop strong social and emotional skills. Sports provide meaningful opportunities for kids to feel confident in themselves and learn valuable life lessons about teamwork, leadership and communication. Teams provide a place for kids to make friends and build relationships.”
Bonamici and other democrats dubbed the bill the “Child Predator Empowerment Act” and argued it wouldn’t make schools safer for students. In fact, she said that the vague language in the bill about what defines the male sex could lead to invasive examinations.
“There is no way this so-called protection bill could be enforced without opening the door to harassment and privacy violations. It opens the door to inspection, not protection, of women and girls in sports,” she said. “Will students have to undergo exams to prove they’re a girl? We are already seeing examples of harassment and questioning of girls who may not conform to stereotypical feminine roles; will they be subject to demands for medical tests and private information? That’s intrusive, offensive and unacceptable, especially from a party of limited government.”
%20-%20dahneshaulis@gmail.com%20-%20Gmail.png){kind=link}