The White House has said it suspended the press pass of CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta, shortly after a news conference on Wednesday where a heated confrontation was witnessed between Acosta and US President Donald Trump.

Acosta and Trump sparred after the former asked the President about the caravan of migrants heading from Latin America to the southern US border. After Trump answered, Acosta tried to follow up with another question, when the President said, “That’s enough!”

As Acosta persisted, the President called him a “rude, terrible person”.

A White House intern could be seen unsuccessfully trying to grab the microphone from Acosta, but he refused to give it up and attempted to ask a further question.

A video of the incident soon appeared online.

“CNN should be ashamed of themselves, having you work for them,” Trump told Accosta. “The way you treat Sarah Huckabee [Sanders] is horrible,”

In a statement issued by White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders later, Acosta was accused of “placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern”.

“President Trump believes in a free press and expects and welcomes tough questions of him and his Administration. We will, however, never tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern…,” Sanders posted.

President Trump believes in a free press and expects and welcomes tough questions of him and his Administration. We will, however, never tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern…

— Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) November 8, 2018

Calling the conduct “absolutely unacceptable”, Sanders added that it was “also completely disrespectful to the reporter’s colleagues not to allow them an opportunity to ask a question.”

She asserted that President Trump had given the press “more access than any President in history”.

“As a result of today’s incident, the White House is suspending the hard pass of the reporter involved until further notice,” Sanders concluded, not before castigating CNN for supporting Acosta.

The senior journalist took to Twitter to post he had been denied entry to the White House. “I’ve just been denied entrance to the WH. Secret Service just informed me I cannot enter the WH grounds for my 8pm hit.”

I’ve just been denied entrance to the WH. Secret Service just informed me I cannot enter the WH grounds for my 8pm hit

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) November 8, 2018

He called “a lie” Sanders’s assertion that he tried to place his hands on a woman intern.

(With agency inputs)