Fox News Bureau Chief Personally Led the Anti-Trump Boycott and Now MAGA Wants the Network Punished

Donald Trump's crackdown on the press has turned his favourite network against him. Fox News Washington bureau chief Bryan Boughton, who chairs the White House television pool, issued a memo on Monday pulling every major-network camera off the president.

The move followed Trump's decision to ban CNN, MS NOW (formerly MSNBC), and Politico from the White House. Fox joined ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN in suspending pooled television coverage, leaving the president without a major-network crew as he arrived in New York for the United Nations General Assembly.

Fox's Own Chief Pulled the Plug

Boughton, acting as the pool's rotational chair, told subscribers that the television pool would not cover events designated as pool coverage of the president. 'This follows the White House's position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties,' he wrote. 'There will be no replacement pool put in place.'

The five networks take turns filming the president and sharing that footage with one another and thousands of outlets worldwide. With no replacement, Trump's first event on Monday, a helipad ribbon-cutting, ran without network microphones, and background noise drowned out his remarks.

MAGA Turns on Fox

The backlash from Trump's base landed on Fox rather than the president. Conservative radio host Todd Starnes said there was 'literally no difference' between the newsrooms at Fox and the banned outlets, and argued Trump should shut the White House briefing room and restore it to its original swimming-pool use. Some Trump supporters online branded the network a 'traitor'.

That anger points to the story's central irony. Trump's attempt to punish critical coverage split the coalition that props up the channel he watches most, and his supporters now want the network he relies on to pay.

Fox Voices Warned It Would Backfire

Fox's own figures had already cautioned against the ban. Chief political analyst Brit Hume said that if Trump believed the crackdown would produce friendlier coverage, 'I think he's dreaming'. Contributor Ari Fleischer, a former White House press secretary, agreed the outlets were biased but rejected exclusion. 'Don't ban them,' he wrote. 'Or one day they'll ban us.'

Trump brushed off the revolt. 'They said they were going to boycott me, but they never boycott me, so I wasn't very worried about that,' he told reporters.

The Fight Heads To Court

CNN, MS NOW, and Politico have sued Trump and senior officials, arguing the ban violates the First and Fifth Amendments and amounts to viewpoint discrimination. The case landed with US District Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee who once ordered the White House to restore CNN correspondent Jim Acosta's press pass. He has set a hearing for Wednesday afternoon.

The White House defended the ban, saying the First Amendment protects the right to publish but does not guarantee a hard pass, a briefing-room seat, or a place in the pool. Trump has already signalled he will appeal.

For now, the president heads into a week of high-stakes diplomacy, including a state visit from China's Xi Jinping, without the cameras that normally record his every move.