Karoline Leavitt Cites Trump’s ‘Ratings Bonanza’ During Campaign YouTube Hits to Defend Seizing Control of Press Pool

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the Trump administration’s new policy of dictating which journalists get to join the White House press pool during a Wednesday morning interview with the remarkably pro-Trump Fox & Friends co-host Lawrence Jones.

Leavitt dropped a bombshell on the White House Correspondents Association (WHCA) during Tuesday’s press briefing by announcing that the group would no longer get to decide which reporters from which outlets will rotate in and out of the press pool coverage of the White House.

Leavitt announced:

I’m proud to announce that we are going to give the power back to the people who read your papers, who watch television shows, and who listen to your radio stations. Moving forward, the White House press pool will be determined by the White House press team. Legacy outlets who have participated in the press pool for decades will still be allowed to join, fear not, but we will also be offering the privilege to well-deserving outlets who have never been allowed to share in this awesome responsibility. Just like we added a new media seat in this briefing room, legacy media outlets who have been here for years will still participate in the pool, but new voices are going to be welcomed in as well. As part of these changes, we will continue the rotation amongst the five major television networks to ensure the president’s remarks are heard far and wide around this world. We will add additional streaming services which reach different audiences than traditional cable and broadcast.

This controversial new policy flouts a century of bipartisan agreement on how pool reporters are selected, and drew immediate pushback from WHCA President Eugene Daniels, who argued in a searing letter that “In a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps.”

Fox News White House reporter Jacqui Heinrich, who sits on the WHCA board, also condemned the new policy, insisting that this does “not give the power back to the people” but gives the power to the White House. Heinrich also warned MAGA that this precedent can be used against conservative media by future Democratic administrations.

Jones noted that Leavitt “made some headlines” with this announcement and asked her to explain the process going forward. She reiterated many of her comments from the briefing, saying, “We’re shaking up Washington in more ways than one.”

Jones followed up by asking, “Is the president doing this because of all the podcasts that were so instrumental in the YouTube shows that were instrumental during his last election win?”

Leavitt pounced on the softball question.

“The president owned the nontraditional media lane, those podcasts for some of the most successful ratings bonanza that those podcast hosts have ever seen when Donald Trump joined their shows,” she answered. “And so we want to continue that effort because that’s how you reach a bulk of America today.”

“We want to continue that effort because that’s how you reach a bulk of America today,” she continued. “They’re not tuning in to the legacy media outlets. They are listening to their podcasts when they drive to work; they are reading nontraditional outlets and digital sites. And so, those voices deserve a seat at the table. And that’s what we’re trying to do here.”

She is correct to note how dramatically the media landscape has changed in just the past few years; and Trump’s exploitation of nontraditional — and almost exclusively friendly — podcasts and YouTube shows to get his message out while avoiding any tough questions helped him win the election.

That said, the mark of good journalism isn’t necessarily good ratings. The most valuable White House reporters ask tough questions without fear or favor, and are eager to speak truth to power regardless of the partisan allegiance of the president. The fact that pro-Trump outlets get good ratings should be immaterial to their inclusion into a press pool, and this administration’s selection of who gets to report on them represents a dangerous erosion of the Fourth Estate, a fundamental pillar of American democracy.

But traditional journalists don’t rate as well as Joe Rogan, so here we are.

Watch above via Fox News.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.