President Donald Trump has again floated the idea of booting reporters from the White House and turning the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room into an indoor swimming pool. The proposal was reported on Tuesday, and it comes after months in which Trump has repeatedly gone back to the same idea in private and in public.
What makes the latest report matter is not just the image of a pool where the briefing room now sits. It is that Trump, in an Oval Office meeting in August, personally pitched the change to Karoline Leavitt and told her the move could be her “last legacy.” Three sources familiar with the discussions said he raised it with her on multiple other occasions before she left the administration on Aug. 27, which suggests this was not a throwaway joke but a proposal he kept pressing.
Trump’s fascination with the space is tied to history as much as politics. He wants to restore the indoor pool installed for Franklin D. Roosevelt, and he has treated the old arrangement as proof that the room can be repurposed. Richard Nixon’s administration later covered that pool to make room for the press, which is why the briefing room exists in its current form today. Trump also posted images on Truth Social in September comparing the briefing room, labeled “Fake News,” with a gold-adorned pool labeled “FDR Pool.” Bill Pulte reportedly prepared a visual mock-up of the idea.
That is where the friction sharpens. Trump has had advisers who historically resisted removing journalists from the White House because of the logistical headaches and political fallout, yet he now has more allies encouraging the move. At the same time, he has already escalated the clash with the press in other ways, banning, MS NOW and Politico from the White House in September before a federal judge ordered their access restored and found the administration had violated their First Amendment rights. Earlier this month, the Justice Department launched an antitrust investigation into the five major television networks after they temporarily suspended White House pool coverage in protest of the restrictions.
Steven Cheung said the administration has not closed the door on anything, adding that all options remain on the table and that an announcement will come when appropriate. For now, that leaves the question hanging in plain sight: whether Trump is merely taunting the press corps again, or whether the White House is preparing to announce a change that would physically remove reporters from the room that has defined daily presidential coverage for generations.
