President Trump on Sunday floated tearing out the White House press briefing room to restore the indoor swimming pool that once occupied the same space, according to The Gateway Pundit. The suggestion came in a Truth Social post featuring a side-by-side graphic: on one side, an image of the current James S. Brady Press Briefing Room labeled “Fake News” and “Before”; on the other, a photo of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s White House pool labeled “FDR Pool” and “After.”
The post is the latest escalation in a running conflict between the president and the White House press corps, a fight that has moved from rhetorical jabs to courtroom battles and reshuffled travel pools over the past several weeks.
A Pool With History
The “FDR Pool” was built during Franklin Roosevelt’s administration in 1933, reportedly to help the president manage his polio symptoms through aquatic therapy. It served as a fixture of the White House for nearly four decades until 1970, when it was converted into a press briefing room during Richard Nixon’s presidency. That room, later named for James S. Brady, has hosted daily press briefings and televised exchanges between administrations and journalists ever since.
Trump’s graphic frames the proposed restoration as a symbolic upgrade — swapping the briefing room, which he tagged with the “Fake News” label he has long used to describe mainstream outlets, for the older aquatic facility. It echoes something of a theme at Mar-a-Lago and other Trump properties, where ornate gold fixtures and historical flourishes have been a signature aesthetic. Whether the post represents a genuine policy intention or a piece of political theater is unclear; no formal proposal has been announced.
Press Access Fight Escalates
The pool post landed amid a broader battle over which outlets get access to the president. Earlier this month, the White House removed CNN, MS Now, and Politico from its press pool. Last week, a federal judge ruled that the ban was likely unconstitutional and ordered the administration to restore the three outlets’ access.
Those reinstatements did not end the standoff. According to The Gateway Pundit, much of the mainstream press pool then opted to boycott the president’s activities — a move that backfired when conservative outlets were given the seats that opened up. Real America’s Voice took over pool coverage for Trump’s trip to New York for the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, and the network was also tapped, alongside Lindell TV, for television pool duty during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit in Washington, D.C.
On Saturday, Real America’s Voice handled television pool coverage for the president’s trip to Tennessee aboard Air Force One, while CNN was left off the manifest. The Gateway Pundit said it was also part of the pool for that day’s travel.
CNN, MS Now Push Back
CNN responded sharply to its exclusion, arguing that no outlet had stepped in to replace it in the pool and that the arrangement produced “limited coverage” of the trip, with “no TV pool coverage” — even though Real America’s Voice was traveling with the president and distributing audio and video to any outlet that wanted to use it, per The Gateway Pundit’s account.
MS Now went further, describing conservative outlets as “state media” and suggesting the White House effectively subsidizes them through free airfare aboard Air Force One. A former White House Correspondents’ Association president made a similar argument on air, per the outlet’s report — a claim the conservative publication pointedly noted came from a former Politico reporter, recalling the $8 million Politico received from the federal government during the Biden administration.
The White House Correspondents’ Association, which traditionally coordinates pool rotations, has been a particular target of Trump’s ire throughout the dispute.
What Comes Next
It remains to be seen whether the swimming pool idea moves beyond a social media post. The briefing room sits in the West Wing and is wired for broadcast — any renovation would be a major logistical undertaking, and prior administrations have treated the space as a permanent fixture of White House operations. Still, as a piece of messaging, the post accomplishes something no policy memo could: it keeps the press-access fight in the headlines and puts the president’s preferred framing — briefing room as “Fake News” headquarters, pool as restoration — in front of his followers directly.
For now, the practical effects of the standoff are already visible in the composition of the traveling press corps. Conservative outlets that once complained of being shut out of pool rotations are now flying on Air Force One and distributing feeds to the rest of the press. Whether that arrangement holds — and whether the briefing room survives the president’s latest provocation — is an open question. What is clear is that the relationship between the White House and the press has entered a phase in which even the building’s architecture is fair game.
Source: www.thegatewaypundit.com — https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/trump-floats-replacing-white-house-briefing-room-original/