A Tacoma Newspaper Fights Back

...Last week, the American Society of News Editors and 37 other organizations signed a letter delivered to Obama’s press secretary, Jay Carney, protesting the lack of access. The letter listed seven news events handled this way from July 2013 to October 2013, including the president’s meetings with Israeli and Palestinian negotiators, and with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

The administration declares these news events private, but then posts the “official” pictures on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and hands them out for use by the media. Given no alternative, many of us have published them.

The TNT has run 10 photos taken by White House photographer Pete Souza since Obama took office. Two were taken in 2009 of the Obamas’ new puppy, Bo, but the others were of news events.

From now on, we won’t publish White House handout photos of events that should have been open to news photographers, even if that means going without a photo. As the protest letter said, closing the door to the press gets in the way of “the public’s ability to independently monitor and see what its government is doing.”

Read more here: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2013/11/24/2911435/sorry-mr-president-but-official.html#storylink=cpy