Harris-Walz Campaign Selectively Barring Reporters

The Harris-Walz campaign has continuously denied reporters and photographers from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette access to the campaign events, reportedly due to labor action within the company, according to The Daily Caller citing an op-ed from Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editor Brandon McGinley.

Vice President Kamala Harris and running mate Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz began their bus tour in the battleground state of Georgia, kicking off their outreach to voters following the Democratic National Convention (DNC). McGinley called out the Democratic campaign Saturday, claiming it has barred “Post-Gazette reporters from the veep announcement, from parts of the Democratic National Convention and (as of this writing) from all future events where they have the ability to control access.”

The barring from the campaign is reportedly connected to labor actions that began in October 2022, when a journalists’ strike erupted after a Teamsters unit, one of the largest labor unions in America, went on strike over the suspension of a legacy health care plan. McGinley stated that as negotiations have continued, the union interfered with the outlet’s reporting and allegedly persuaded Democratic officials and candidates to decline interviews with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

The move by Harris and Walz’s campaign to block reporters from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, however, isn’t the first time the campaign has pushed against the press. On July 29, the Associated Press’s chief political reporter, Steve Peoples, posted on X (formerly Twitter) that the campaign was “blocking reporters from talking to voters outside the press pen at the Whitmer/Shapiro event in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.”