Trump’s Attacks on the Media Are Self-Defeating

When the president asserts that all negative coverage is false, he seals his party off from necessary criticism.

Brendan Smialowski / AFP / Getty September 20, 2026, 5:46 PM ET Share Save Donald Trump is presiding over a failing presidency and lashing out at the news media—most recently by banning CNN, Politico , and MS NOW from the White House. There might seem to be a connection between these two things, but the causal link is not that Trump is punishing the press because he is failing ; rather, it’s the opposite. His inability to govern is in part a consequence of his hatred for the news media.