Digging deep into free-speech precedents in recent American history, a federal appeals panel handed The Associated Press an incremental loss on Friday in its continuing battle with the Trump administration over access by its journalists to cover presidential events.

By a 2-1 margin, judges on the three-judge U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington granted Trump a stay in enforcement of a lower-court ruling that the administration had improperly punished the AP for the content of its speech — in this case not renaming the Gulf of Mexico to Trump’s liking.

The news outlet’s access to events in the Oval Office and Air Force One was cut back starting in February after the AP said it would continue referring to the Gulf of Mexico in its copy, while noting Trump’s wishes that it instead be renamed the Gulf of America.

For decades, a reporter and photographer for the AP — a 179-year-old wire service whose material is sent to thousands of news outlets across the world and carried on its own website, reaching billions of people — had been part of a “pool” that covers a president in places where space is limited.

The decision itself was aimed only at whether to continue the stay. But the majority and dissenting opinions together totaled 55 pages and delved deeply into First Amendment precedents and questions about whether places like the Oval Office and Air Force One were, in effect, private spaces.