From the AP:
Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who has not held a press conference in nearly four weeks of campaigning, on Tuesday banned reporters from her first meetings with world leaders, allowing access only to photographers and a television crew.
CNN, which was providing the television coverage for news organizations, decided to pull its TV crew, effectively denying Palin the high visibility she had sought. …
The campaign told the TV producer, print and wire reporters in the press pool that follows the Alaska governor that they would not be admitted with the photographers and camera crew taken in to photograph the meetings. At least two news organizations, including The Associated Press, objected and were told that the decision was not subject to discussion.
Late Update: The Times has more details about what it calls the “media rebellion.” There’s some suggestion that the McCain camp has relented, at least in part, though that’s not entirely clear.
Later Update: Looks like the campaign relented on CNN being able to take a producer to the photo op, according to Politico:
The campaign also at first moved to bar CNN, the television network designated for pool duty, from sending its editorial producer – basically a hybrid print/video journalist – though the campaign budged when the network threatened to withhold its cameras as well.
Latest Update: All just a “miscommunication,” a Palin flack now tells the AP. Reporters and producers will be able to accompany cameras into Palin’s later photo ops with world leaders. The AP, in its obscure way, telegraphs that there was no miscommunication at all. The same flack had earlier said no reporters or producers were going to be allowed in the photo ops.
Later Than Late Update: Here’s the pool report from Palin’s photo op with Hamid Karzai from which print reporters were excluded. Not sure which is more pathetic: that Palin is so not ready for primetime she can’t risk a photo op in the presence of real reporters — or that the traveling press decided to stake its righteous claim on missing a 29-second photo op.
