White House Press’ Access Complaint Obscures Real Story: Why Keep Tiger Woods Under Wraps?
The White House Correspondents Association complaint about access to President Obama during his weekend golf outing is part of a longstanding tension between a press corps that always wants more access, and a press office that seems reflexively prone to denying it. This time, there’s an added territorial dimension, as Golf Digest reporter Tim Rosaforte managed to scoop the White House press on President Obama’s golf outing with pioneering golfer Tiger Woods, and while White House Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest correctly noted that this weekend’s press shutout is par for the course, no one has bothered to explain why Woods is apparently too radioactive to merit even an official photo.
When it comes to the White House press corps, membership doesn’t always have its privileges. There are White House reporters who tirelessly cover every utterance of every White House spokesman, and follow President Obama on countless news-free trips, who will never get to ask Obama a question at a press conference, even as the press office grants exclusives to people who wouldn’t know a West Wing from a Buffalo Wing. That little bit of insult to injury is part of the dynamic this time, but it should be noted that Golf Digest‘s Rosaforte doesn’t appear to have been given favorable treatment by the White House press office. Since he’s not a White House reporter, the press office has less to say about what Rosaforte does, while Rosaforte seems to have used connections formed on his own beat to gain access to the clubhouse at The Floridian. If there’s any consolation to be had, it’s that Rosaforte’s coup likely annoyed the White House press office as much as being shut out annoyed the White House press pool.
Deputy White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest release a statement, Sunday evening, in response to White House Correspondents Association President Ed Henry:
“The press access granted by the White House today is entirely consistent with the press access offered for previous presidential golf outings. It’s also consistent with the press access promised to the White House Press Corps prior to arrival in Florida on Friday evening.”
What Earnest says is undeniably true, as borne out by the recent brouhaha over the paucity of photographs from the Camp David presidential retreat, but both Earnest and Henry miss a key point: shutting the White House press from presidential vacations doesn’t usually involve actual news.
The real meat of this story, if there is any, is that if it hadn’t been for Tim Rosaforte’s efforts, the world might never have known of a truly newsworthy event, the first golf game ever between the first black president, and the first black Everything In Golf. The White House only released the names of the President’s golf partners after Rosaforte had already reported on them, and still hasn’t released so much as an official photo. Woods has infamously been plagued by personal problems the last several years, but if he’s too radioactive to be photographed with the President, then why isn’t he too radioactive to play golf with him? More importantly, now that the Tiger is out of the bag, what purpose does it serve not to release an official photo?
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
