White House says self-ads were already scheduled to end, a court just ordered them canceled anyway.

…(cont) On September 24, Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee, ordered the White House to immediately restore the press credentials it had pulled from CNN, MS NOW, and Politico. The order went into the file that morning. The White House went around it that same morning: reporters from all three outlets were turned away at the gate, the court's ink still wet.

A week later, on October 1, two of those same banned outlets, MS NOW and CNN, were airing the ads anyway. The taxpayer-funded commercials promoting the president's leadership were running on the air of the networks the administration had just tried to lock out of covering him. The accounting runs in both directions at once: deny them access, sell them the airtime.

Which brings us to Sunday. Judge Jennifer Rochon, an appointee of President Biden, looked at the $20 million line and issued a temporary restraining order, effective 6:45pm, running at least fourteen days, finding the ads likely unlawful. The order told the administration to cancel whatever portion of the buy was left.

Here is where the reconciliation gets interesting. The administration's position, filed after the fact, was that it had already planned to end the campaign. Voluntary was not on the books anywhere before the judge's signature. The $20 million was. Taxpayers paid first, and the plan to stop paying showed up only once a court asked for it in writing.

Senator Chuck Schumer called Sunday's order "only the beginning." I don't keep a column for beginnings. I keep one for what's spent, and right now it reads $20 million, filed as public service, halted by a judge who didn't buy the label. The gap between the two numbers is the story. It usually is.