Fox News was right. 

After a CNN reporter was barred from a press event at the White House, Fox News came out in solidarity opposing the assault on the First Amendment. 

You have to applaud Fox News for taking a stand, doing the right thing and breaking with the White House on this issue. 

Fox News President Jay Wallace issued this statement: “We stand in strong solidarity with CNN for the right to full access for our journalists as part of a free and unfettered press,” 

CNN and Fox are rarely on the same page. 

But when White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and deputy chief of staff for communications Bill Shine told CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins she could not attend a presser because they did not like her line of questioning during President Donald Trump’s press event with European Union Commissioner Jean-Claude Juncker, not even Fox News could find justification. 

It does not matter whether the White House or Trump himself liked the reporter’s questions. 

Asking tough questions is what journalism is, and Collins was simply doing her job — and doing it well. 

She asked, “Did Michael Cohen betray you, Mr. President?”

It is an important question. 

The odd thing is that the question is one Trump should be more than happy to answer and one that he has alluded to in his infamous Tweets. 

So, what’s the big deal? 

The big deal is not really about the question itself. 

The big deal is all about democracy.

Democracy depends on an open, free and unfettered press. 

A press that only reports the official line of the government and only reports what is flattering to the government is not a free press, it is state-run media. 

Is that where we are headed? 

Is that what the Trump administration wants?

None of this is about liberal versus conservative or Trump verses Never-Trump, it is about freedom. The continuing assault on the press and the First Amendment just needs to stop.  

Collins asked just a few other questions about Cohen and one about a postponed meeting with Vladimir Puttin, hardly the toughest questions this president has ever faced. 

One would expect CNN to come out in strong support of its reporter.

And it did. 

One would also expect journalists throughout the United States to show solidarity. 

And they did. 

Most unexpected, however, is that Fox News would say enough is enough, this is unacceptable and then issue strong statements opposing the action of the White House and supporting its rival, CNN. 

But that is exactly what the conservative media giant did. 

Everyone who loves freedom, democracy and the United States of America should applaud Fox for defending the First Amendment and the freedom of the press.