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The White House Declared a Press Victory. The Record Looked Thinner.
The White House spent February 23 crowing about a supposed press triumph and a model of “transparency,” but the underlying dispute over access and control was still very much alive. The administration’s own messaging showed it was treating press access as a privilege to grant or revoke, which is not exactly the same thing as confidence. The resulting optics were classic Trump-world: loud, brittle, and allergic to scrutiny.