Trump’s comments come amid tensions between the US president and the journalists covering him.
Published October 24, 2026
US President Donald Trump has acknowledged that he may move the White House press corps elsewhere, perhaps away from the presidential palace.
In a social media post Friday, President Trump called a report that he plans to remove the historic pool beneath the White House press briefing room to be restored “fake news.”
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“I never thought I’d do something so stupid!” he wrote in a post on Truth Social.
But President Trump suggested he might relocate the dozens of reporters covering the White House to a “less unpleasant location.”
The New York Times on Tuesday reported that President Trump suggested to former press secretary Caroline Leavitt the idea of moving journalists out of the White House’s famed James S. Brady Press Briefing Room. The proposal was not advanced during Levitt’s term, which ended on August 27th.
President Trump’s comments came amid a tense moment between him and the journalists covering him.
Last month, President Trump expelled journalists from three U.S.-based media outlets (CNN, MS NOW and POLITICO) from the White House, a move that free speech advocates say violates First Amendment protections.
A federal judge ruled that the order was likely unconstitutional, forcing the White House to restore access to journalists. The Trump administration continues to fight the ruling.
President Trump has also regularly reprimanded and denigrated members of the media who he claims are reporting unfairly.
The latest incident occurred during an Oval Office event on Tuesday when President Trump attacked Andrew Feinberg, the White House correspondent for The Independent.
When Feinberg tried to ask a question, Trump said: “What’s wrong? Are you sick? I actually think there’s something wrong with you.” The moment was amplified by the White House on social media.
If President Trump chooses to move forward with renovations to the White House press briefing room, it would be the latest in a long list of projects he has ordered involving renovations to controversial facilities.
Since returning to power last year, the US president has demolished the East Wing of the White House to build a new ballroom, installed concrete paving on the lawn centered around the White House Rose Garden and built a helipad on the South Lawn.
Trump told aides he wanted to restore the indoor pool, built in 1933, where President Franklin D. Roosevelt suffered from polio and often swam to relieve the pain, the Times reported.
In the 1970s, former President Richard Nixon built a floor above the pool to accommodate a briefing room for the growing White House press corps. The pool remains under the floor of the briefing room.
Mr. Levitt acknowledged in an interview Friday that Mr. Trump was “floating” with the idea of restoring the pool.
“Maybe he just wants to restore this city to all of its former glory,” Levitt said on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher.” “I don’t know if he’ll do it.”
The White House did not immediately respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
