White House App Hits No. 1 as Trump TV Launches Amid Press Ban - Newsweek

The White House app climbed to No. 1 in the App Store’s news category just one day after the Trump administration launched Trump TV, the White House said Wednesday.

The 24-hour YouTube livestream debuted Monday, three days after President Donald Trump barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House.

“More and more Americans are gravitating to the app because they want the news straight from the source, not filtered through networks that have spent years distorting the [president’s] record,” the White House wrote in a statement.

On Tuesday, the White House app climbed into the Top 20 among all apps—and No. 1 in the news category. As of Wednesday evening, the app dipped to No. 2.

The app, which launched in May, has a 4.9 out of 5 average rating in the App Store and more than 2 million downloads across the store and Google Play, according to the White House.

In response to a request for Trump TV viewership figures, the White House referred Newsweek to a press release highlighting the White House app’s performance. A YouTube spokesperson referred Newsweek to the White House for analytics.

Labeled “The Essentials Station,” the network features videos of Trump and his administration, with the White House describing it as a place to watch its “biggest moments all in one place.” The stream includes top videos, major remarks and selected highlights, which are available around the clock.

That programming does not necessarily mirror the White House's live schedule. Around 6 p.m. ET Wednesday, for example, the White House streamed live video of Trump and first lady Melania Trump welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping with a rare planeside greeting at Joint Base Andrews.

Trump TV did not carry the welcome live. Instead, it was showing footage from May, when Xi hosted Trump at a welcoming banquet at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, including comments from Trump. Replayed footage of Wednesday's welcome appeared on Trump TV a few minutes later.

The launch comes amid an ongoing rift between the administration and White House press corps.

On Wednesday, a judge heard arguments in a lawsuit brought by CNN, MS NOW and Politico seeking to restore their access to the White House, but did not issue a ruling from the bench.

“Access to the White House is a privilege—not a right,” the Department of Justice (DOJ) wrote in a court filing.

On Monday, CNN, MS NOW and Politico sued the Trump administration in federal court, seeking to restore their access to the White House. The outlets argued that the ban violated their First Amendment rights and challenged the administration’s decision to revoke their press access.

"We notified the government that we are filing a lawsuit today to protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes,” CNN, Politico and MS Now said in a joint statement.

Trump responded to the “expected” lawsuit, criticizing the three outlets and saying they had sued to regain access to the White House.

“As usual, we’ll go for appeal because Fake News people and publications that only write negatively, and who violate our National Security by writing false and defamatory stories with unknown ‘sources,’ shouldn’t be allowed access to the most important Office anywhere in the World,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

The press-access dispute was evident Monday, when major networks skipped coverage of Trump’s White House helipad ceremony.

CNN was scheduled to provide pooled footage as part of a five-network rotation, but after it was barred from the White House, ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox News declined to take its place.

Trump cut a ribbon on the South Lawn before boarding Marine One, though his remarks could not be clearly heard over the noise.

On Friday, Trump announced on Truth Social that CNN, MS NOW and Politico were being banned from the White House over what the president called “a result of their constant 'reporting' FAKE NEWS!"

Correspondents from the three outlets were turned away from the White House on Saturday morning.

The DOJ filing says the president concluded that the three had “failed to maintain basic minimum ‘standards of professionalism and decorum expected of those given access to the White House Complex,’” including by “publishing sensitive or classified information.” The administration has also cited national security concerns in defending the decision to revoke their access.

Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Edward T. Cummins