DOMINANT ANGLE
Manila sees in this revolt by American chains a direct echo of its own battles for press freedom, from the closure of ABS-CBN to the lawsuits against Rappler.
Dominant angle identified — does not reflect unanimity of this country’s media
KEY POINTS
- 01
CNN, MS NOW, and Politico announced on Monday, September 21, 2026, that they will sue the Trump administration in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, citing the First Amendment.
- 02
The five major American networks (ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox, NBC) suspended White House pool coverage on Monday in solidarity with CNN, preventing any TV coverage of Trump's trip to the UN.
- 03
Donald Trump called the media a "cancer" and a threat to national security, while claiming on Truth Social that he is only targeting FAKE NEWS.
ANALYSIS
Manille, September 22, 2026. In the Philippines, where Rappler and its co-founder Maria Ressa have paid a high price for their years of confrontation with the government, the clash between Washington and its newsrooms resonates like a familiar mirror. Rappler reports that CNN, MS NOW, and Politico announced on Monday, September 21, 2026, that they will sue Donald Trump and his administration in the federal court of the District of Columbia, after the withdrawal over the weekend of their journalists' accreditation to the White House, decided on Friday, September 18, 2026. The three newsrooms denounce a revocation "without notice or procedure" and invoke the First Amendment, which protects press freedom and freedom of expression. "This threatens press freedom and the public's right to independent information," they write in a joint statement cited by Rappler. An emergency hearing could be held as early as this week, according to the three newsrooms.
GMA News emphasizes a rare fact: the five major American networks, ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox, and NBC, suspended their pool coverage of the White House on Monday in solidarity with CNN, which was supposed to film for all the channels that day. As a direct consequence, no American television covered Trump's trip to the United Nations General Assembly in New York. "No administration should sanction a media outlet for questioning its reporting," the five groups said in a joint statement. GMA News also recalls that the administration "has upset decades of tradition" in its relations with the press, by withdrawing access to major media outlets while promoting new, more favorable ones.
Trump, cited by GMA News, calls these media outlets "cancer" and a threat to national security, while assuring on Truth Social that he is not targeting "the free press" but is waging a war against "FAKE NEWS". For Manila, where the closure of ABS-CBN in 2020 had already shown how accreditation or a license can serve as a political lever against newsrooms deemed too critical, this American showdown confirms that no democracy is immune to such use of executive power against the press. The unprecedented solidarity between competing channels, meanwhile, reminds us that the profession can still close ranks in the face of common pressure.
