Seventh Circuit Says Governor Can Limit Media Access to Press Conferences

Steven D. Schwinn, University of Illinois Chicago School of Law

The Seventh Circuit ruled on Friday that a state governor can limit media access to press conferences, so long as the limits are reasonable and viewpoint neutral. The ruling rebuffs the plaintiffs' challenges and allows the governor to continue to limited access to press conferences based on viewpoint neutral criteria.

The case, MacIver Institute for Public Policy v. Evers, arose when Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers prevented two reporters from the MacIver Institute from attending his limited-access press conferences. Evers restricted access based on a set of criteria that included things like the length of time that a media outlet has published news, whether a media outlet is a periodical or has an established television or radio presence, whether the reporters are paid or full-time correspondents, and whether the reporters and media outlet are "bona fide" and "of repute in their profession," among other similar criteria. The Institute sued, arguing that free speech and free press guaranteed a right to equal access for all media.

The court rejected the Institute's challenge. It ruled that the governor's limited-access press conferences were "nonpublic" forums, and that the governor permissibly limited access based on criteria that had nothing to do with a media outlet's viewpoint. Moreover, the court noted that the Institute provided no evidence that Evers applied the viewpoint neutral criteria in a viewpoint-based way. The court noted that under the governor's viewpoint-neutral criteria, the governor allowed access to a variety of media across the range of political ideologies, and that the governor similarly disallowed access to a variety of media across the range of political ideologies.