Journalists from CNN, MS NOW and Politico were denied access to the White House grounds Saturday, a day after President Donald Trump announced a ban on three news organizations because of reporting he disliked.

Akayla Gardner, a White House correspondent for MS NOW, said that her White House-issued access badge failed to work at the security entrance where reporters typically enter near the West Wing.“The officer asked me to hand over my badge; he said that it was disabled,” Gardner said in an on-air interview. “I asked why I could not get inside; he said it was above him.”

A photographer for MS NOW was also asked to relinquish their badge, but a producer for the network was allowed into the White House, Gardner said.

Betsy Klein, a veteran CNN correspondent, described a similar experience that occurred about an hour later. She said that a White House security officer, whom she has known for years, informed her that her badge had been deactivated.

“I asked if he had any more details he could share with me,” Klein said in an on-air interview. “He said I should be referred to the White House press office for more information.”

Cheyenne Haslett, a reporter at Politico, was also denied access to the White House on Saturday morning, according to a note to staff from Jonathan Greenberger, Politico’s editor-in-chief, that was described in the publication’s Playbook newsletter.

Trump points to ‘negative stories’

Trump abruptly announced Friday afternoon that he would ban MS NOW, CNN and Politico from the White House, a stark escalation in his ever-expanding battles with the news media.

The president attributed the ban to his displeasure with the outlets’ coverage of his administration. “There’s something wrong with a country that can allow people to write purposely negative stories,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Friday afternoon.

“Now, if they want to write them, that’s fine, but I don’t have to let them into my — into the people’s house,” he added.

The White House press office declined to answer questions Saturday about the ban, referring instead to Trump’s earlier comments.

Networks respond

MS NOW said in a statement that it “intends to take any and all steps necessary to defend our First Amendment rights and the essential role of independent journalism in our democracy.”

In its own statement, CNN described Trump’s ban as “illegal,” and said it would continue its reporting on the U.S. government “regardless of any attempts to restrict physical access to the White House and other government buildings, or any other attempts to impede our journalism.” Greenberger wrote in his note that Politico stands “by (Haslett) and all reporters here covering the White House.”

First Amendment experts said Friday that Trump’s media ban was unlikely to survive a legal challenge because the president explicitly connected his decision to bar CNN, Politico and MS NOW to the content of their reporting. That’s “textbook viewpoint discrimination,” Bruce D. Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press, said, referring to a kind of First Amendment violation that courts have historically disallowed.

In Trump’s first term, the White House lost a similar legal battle after it revoked the press pass for CNN reporter Jim Acosta, whose credentials were later restored.