The American courts keep defending the First Amendment despite President Trump’s best efforts to crack down on free speech and the free press.

That’s my glass-half-full assessment of this media moment.

As you already know, a pair of judges ruled against Trump this week, one in DC and another in Iowa.

Many other courts have also upheld First Amendment rights during Trump 2.0, sometimes without garnering as much attention. Judges have scolded the Trump administration for violating the First Amendment rights of ICE critics; for silencing the Voice of America network; and for sending secret subpoenas to news outlets.

Back in February, a judge in Oregon even blocked the administration from enforcing a rule against noisy protests outside federal buildings, essentially finding that loud speech is still free speech.

Last month Reuters counted a total of 75 federal rulings finding that the Trump administration had “infringed on First Amendment rights including freedoms of speech, religion, and the press.”

The administration has pushed back in some, though not every, instance.

I captured all of this in a new analysis for CNN.com here. It notes that numerous free-speech cases are pending in the courts, including Disney/ABC’s lawsuit charging the FCC with violating the First Amendment, and The New York Times’ lawsuit over the Pentagon’s press access restrictions.

First Amendment groups and media execs expect the tests will keep coming.

“Trump is always testing, testing,” a source at a rival network said to me, invoking that famous line from “Jurassic Park” about the velociraptors “testing the fences for the weaknesses, systematically. They remember.”

“He’s probing to see what he can get away with,” the source remarked not long after Trump announced his ban last Friday.

That’s why the media’s response – an unusual show of solidarity — matters so much.

“We always have to anticipate the prospect that a feckless and reflexively defiant White House will inject heart attacks into the legal system,” law professor Harry Litman wrote on Substack yesterday. “But if the media hangs tough and the courts stay faithful to the law, we can continue to ride out the storm.”

Though the Trump admin appeared to defy Judge Timothy Kelly’s ruling for several hours yesterday, journalists from CNN, MS NOW and Politico are now back at work at the White House. The TV pool is resuming its usual coverage now that CNN has been allowed back in.

CBS is on pool duty at the White House today. CNN also has an in-town pool assignment as the president is set to travel to the National Archives with Chinese leader Xi Jinping later this morning. CNN’s John Berman said on air that the two leaders are going “to view the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution – maybe the Bill of Rights, which enshrines freedom of the press.”

Both networks confirmed that they are moving forward with pooled coverage, although the situation remains fluid given the administration’s recent actions. “This arrangement can be assessed throughout the day,” Josh Gross of CBS News wrote in an early morning email that I obtained.

In other words, if there are further “shenanigans,” you’ll hear about it. For more on the ongoing court case, check out Katelyn Polantz’s story about what’s next…

Yesterday I was scheduled to interview Washington Post editor Matt Murray on stage at the Texas Tribune Festival, but had to cancel my trip to Austin when it appeared Trump was defying Kelly’s court order. I owe a big thanks to Tribune editor Matthew Watkins, who filled in as interviewer.

Murray discussed this week’s news, saying, “We thought it was important — and I was in touch with the other news organizations — to find a way to make a unified action against the White House. It’s important media organizations act together at this moment.”

“We’re going to report on the White House whether they let us in that briefing room or not,” Murray also pointed out. “We’re almost a year out from when they kicked everyone out of the Pentagon. I don’t know what they thought would happen, but I’m sure the kind of reporting The Washington Post has done is not what they wanted to have happen.”

Though CNN and MS NOW reporters were denied entry to cover the event, the invitees included some notable media figures, including CNN’s soon-to-be owner, Paramount CEO David Ellison.

Also in attendance: Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos and Fox News hosts Bret Baier, Laura Ingraham and Jesse Watters.

As Jeremy Barr noted, “a few months ago, you can be absolutely sure that Maria Bartiromo would have been at this too.”

Andrew Kirell writes: The NYT’s Katie Robertson and The Bulwark’s Will Sommer are both out with stories on MAGA outlets Real America’s Voice and LindellTV attempting to replace the White House TV pool. Sommer calls the effort “bumbling,” while Robertson puts it more gently: “The fledgling pool’s first days have not gone entirely smoothly.”

For starters: RAV aired footage from inside Trump’s motorcade, which former WHCA president Wiejia Jiang flagged as a potential security risk. And then, Sommer reports, the channel “covered Trump’s remarks at the White House only to run into trouble with the microphones, making the president impossible to hear.”

Things got weirder, of course. RAV jabbed at Fox News for showing solidarity with the other networks by posting — and then deleting — footage of Peter Doocy entering a bathroom.

Pro-Trump social media accounts shared the clips, but practically no one else did. RAV exec Parker Sigg acknowledged that “not a single mainstream media network” had requested access to their footage, Robertson reports. Read her story here, and Sommer’s here.

I want to co-sign what CNN political analyst Astead Herndon said on “Erin Burnett OutFront” the other night.

“I don’t think it’s an accident that” Trump attempted a full-blown ban while he’s “at his lowest approval rating yet. This is someone who is lashing out… Picking on an institution which unfortunately is one of the few with lower approval ratings than him.”

Trump’s approval is around 33% while Gallup has ours (the media’s) at 28%. So, Herndon said, “I also think it’s incumbent on the press to say, ‘How do we prove to the public that we are an essential part of this democratic experience?’ Because I do think we are… and I think that we should take that 28 percent number as something that we want to improve, too.”

What’s the deal with that Trumpy new TV ad that says it’s “paid for by the U.S. Government”?

CNN’s Patrick Svitek has the context here. “The commercial started airing Wednesday across the country on cable TV, including Fox News, as well as connected TV.” Last night’s report about the ad on the “CBS Evening News” noted that the ad was set to run on that network in prime time, too.

>> JMSN, the artist whose music is used in the ad, told Matt Viser he didn’t approve its use. “I am looking for a lawyer now in order to see what our options are and how to proceed,” JMSN said. “I have never been in this situation before, so need help in navigating something of this magnitude.” (