American TV networks are not known for solidarity. They compete for scoops, correspondents, ratings, interviews, eyeballs like everywhere else. Which makes the decision by ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News and NBC to suspend pooled coverage of the US president more significant than any recent Trump-media wrangle. Last week, White House barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico after Trump accused them of producing 'fiction and lies', without identifying examples.




Fox News, hardly known for its anti-Trump redoubt, joined ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN in declaring: 'No administration should restrict a news organisation because it objects to its reporting.' They acted on those words.




Journalists require access to governments. Governments naturally prefer access to journalists who make them look good. Confusing the latter preference with China-style entitlement is how reporting degenerates into stenography. An administration need not enjoy criticism.




It should, however, expect and deal with it in a manner other than shutdown. White House's defence is that it's combating 'fake news'. J D Vance has argued that unfavourable outlets are not entitled to 'special access'. The banned three, meanwhile, are challenging their exclusion in court to 'defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports'. This, ironically, sounds almost radical to many ears that see executive coercion as 'natural' in the Darwinian sense. The joint pushback corrects this fallacy by challenging it.




US mainstream media is routinely accused - sometimes fairly - of tribalism, and excessive self-importance. Here, its competitive instincts yielded to something more important: collective defence of independent scrutiny, and refusal to purchase access with obedience. Respect.