An Epoch Times photographer handed Trump a folder, he took it, and the White House isn't saying why

As President Trump was leaving a Sept. 12 Congressional Medal of Honor Society event in the White House, Epoch Times photojournalist Samira Bouaou broke protocol by entering a restricted area and handing Trump a purple folder. "Trump accepted the folder and appeared to open it briefly as he departed before quickly shutting it," The Washington Post reported Tuesday, citing several news photographers who witnessed the event. "It was not clear what was inside the folder. Photographers who asked Bouaou afterward why she did it and what the folder contained said she declined to provide details."

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has discussed Bouaou's folder situation with the White House Correspondents' Association executive board, and the White House has reviewed the incident, but nobody will say anything about it on the record. One White House official told the Post that the matter has been "dealt with." Bouaou, who had recently received a Secret Service pass to attend White House briefings and other events, has not been seen at the White House since the encounter, other photographers say.

The Epoch Times, launched in New York in 2000 by a group of Chinese Americans, is believed to have close ties to the Falun Gong spiritual group, an affiliation the newspaper denies. Falun Gong and the Epoch Times are both banned in China. Ming Xia, a political science professor at the Graduate Center at the City University of New York, tells the Post that the newspaper's part-time journalists "support the Falun Gong because they are Falun Gong practitioners. ... They are not professional journalists and they do not follow the protocols professional journalists abide by. That's how they can be very pushy and aggressive." Xia said the Falun Gong is eager to exploit Trump's hardline stance on Beijing.

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