CNN Won't Air Trump Campaign Ad Attacking CNN

"CNN would accept the ad if the images of reporters and anchors are removed," the network said in a statement to BuzzFeed News.

CNN has for the second time declined to air a Trump campaign advertisement because of anti-media content.

The new ad, entitled "Let President Trump Do His Job," casts the press as the president's enemy and features clips of various mainstream media news anchors, including CNN personalities like Don Lemon, Dana Bash, Fareed Zakaria, Anderson Cooper, and John King.

Trump's reelection campaign committee said in a press release that it had attempted to buy placement for the ad on CNN, but that the network had blocked the ad buy. In May, CNN also did not air a Trump ad because it included a graphic that called the media "fake news."

In the ad, various members of the media are shown while a narrator says that the "president's enemies don't want him to succeed."

CNN said that it had asked the advertiser for changes to be made to the ad, as it also did in May with the "fake news" spot.

"CNN would accept the ad if the images of reporters and anchors are removed," a network spokesperson said in a statement to BuzzFeed News. "Anchors and reporters don’t have 'enemies,' as the ad states, but they do hold those in power accountable across the political spectrum and aggressively challenge false and misleading statements and investigate wrong-doing."

“Today, CNN provided further proof that the network earns this mistrust every day by censoring President Trump’s message to the American people by blocking our paid campaign ad," Michael Glassner, executive director of Trump's reelection efforts, said in a statement. "Clearly, the only viewpoint CNN allows on air is CNN’s."

April Ryan, a CNN contributor featured in the ad, tweeted that it was a "sad day" that she was singled out.

Sad day I am singled out as an enemy of the White House as this racial hate is going on just for asking real questi… https://t.co/zpvW2jTB11

The disagreement comes amid a broader battle between the White House and the network that has intensified recently. When questioned by CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta after making brief comments on Monday, Trump delivered a familiar barb, saying, "I like real news, not fake news; you are fake news." Acosta, who sparred at a press briefing earlier this month with the White House's Stephen Miller, has become the face of the fight between the network and the administration.

In recent months, the president's hostility against CNN has turned more aggressive, particularly in the wake of the June resignation of three well-known employees over a retracted Russia story. On Tuesday morning, he retweeted an image that showed the "Trump train" running over a cartoon person covered by the CNN logo. The White House told BuzzFeed News that the image, which was reminiscent of Trump's July tweet of a WWE-inspired video of him beating up CNN, was inadvertently posted and then immediately deleted.

In May, during the first incident, CNN said it had requested the Trump campaign remove the "fake news" graphic from its ad. "The mainstream media is not fake news, and therefore the ad is false and per policy will be accepted only if that graphic is deleted," CNN said in a statement at the time.

Here's the ad:

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