The White House denied access to a CNN reporter from a news conference with President Donald Trump that was open to other journalists. In a statement released by the network, CNN said White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins was denied access to cover the event with Trump and Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, in the Rose Garden.

According to the CNN statement, after posing questions to Trump earlier in the day as the network pool reporter, Collins was told by the White House deputy chief of staff for communications, Bill Shine, and press secretary Sarah Sanders that her questions were inappropriate. Collins had asked the president about his former lawyer Michael Cohen and about reports of Russian President Vladimir Putin not accepting a White House invitation for another summit between the two leaders.

CNN on Tuesday evening aired a recording that Cohen made of him and Trump discussing a payment that is believed to have been intended to silence former Playboy model Karen McDougal. McDougal says she had an affair with Trump in 2006, but the president has denied the affair and knowing about any payments to her. National security adviser John Bolton said that the second meeting with Putin should wait until after the Robert Mueller investigation was over, a day after a Kremlin aide said that Putin was hesitant to accept the invitation because of the fallout from last week’s summit.

This decision to bar a member of the press is retaliatory in nature and not indicative of an open and free press. CNN demanded a better decision from the White House. The press secretary did not deny that Collins was kept out of the event but claimed that other CNN journalists were welcome to attend in her place. CNN took a firm stand to support their staff and insisted that the questions Collins asked were not inappropriate.