Fox News has been a member of the White House press pool rotation since 1997.
Posted by The Michael Berry Show, Checked
- Sources
- 3 support4 context
- Said
- 1 time·
- Confidence
- 50%
The Michael Berry ShowSep 23, 2026
Tier-1 sources (Reuters, AP, BBC) confirm Fox News is one of the five networks in the White House TV pool rotation, but none gives the year Fox joined, and the only source that addresses entry says the exact year is not pinned down.
The played clip relays this claim without endorsing it. It counts as passed on, not against the post.
What was said
… presidential advisor David Axelrod argued Fox News is not a real news organization, and the bigger thing is that other news organizations like yours ought not to treat them that way. And today, the White House took its first concrete step in that direction. The administration contacted the White House pool, the five network rotation that has, for decades, shared the cost and duties of daily coverage of the presidency, and to which Fox News has belonged since 1997, and made available for round robin interviews the executive pay czar, Ken Feinberg. But the administration specified that all members of the pool were welcome except Fox News. …
The Michael Berry Show · · from the transcriptPost →What we found
Supports. Multiple tier-1 sources list Fox News as one of the five members of the White House TV pool (CNN, ABC, CBS, Fox News, NBC) that rotate coverage.[1][2][4]
Context. The Substack history notes Fox News Channel launched in October 1996 and joined the rotation by negotiation among bureau chiefs, but states that the exact year of entry is not pinned down in accessible sources.[5]
Context. Sources describing the 2009 Obama-era Fox exclusion episode show Fox was already a pool member by then, but none states when it joined, so no source confirms or contradicts 1997.[3][6][7]
Sources
7 sources: 3 fact-checkers, 1 tier 1, 3 not rated
- 1Justice Department probes TV networks over Trump pool boycottreuters.com · fact-checker · cited for: supports
- 2CNN, MS NOW and Politico ask a court to block Trump from enforcing his White House media banapnews.com · fact-checker · cited for: supports
- 3Trump's Ban of News Organizations Goes Beyond Obama, Biden ...factcheck.org · fact-checker · cited for: context
- 4White House press ban - what is the pool and why is it in a ...bbc.co.uk · tier 1 · cited for: supports
- 5The White House Network TV Pool: A History of Access ...brendonbeebe.substack.com · not rated · cited for: context
- 6What is the White House press pool, and why is it now under threat?sg.news.yahoo.com · not rated · cited for: context
- 7WH bars pool reporters, Fox and other networks push backdenisonforum.org · not rated · cited for: context
Where this claim was made
Said in 1 published post
Related claims
- Barack Obama previously removed Fox News from the White House press pool.False
- Fox News launched in 1996.True
- The Trump White House removed CNN, MSNBC, and Politico from the White House press pool.Can’t tell
- People at Fox News have been supplying internal memos to the White House since 2017.Can’t tell
- In March 2021, Brian Stelter hosted a segment discussing whether Joe Biden should remove Fox News from the White House press pool.True