President Trump appeared at the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, held in Washington, D.C., on Friday, with a new location and a significantly reduced list of attendees, after the event was canceled in April after a gunman fired shots during the event.
Moved to the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in the nation’s capital instead of the Washington Hilton and reduced from 2,600 guests to about 680, it was not a star-studded event that sees celebrity guests each year snuggling with reporters and editors as they sit with the politicians they cover — and whose optics are criticized every year by journalists and pundits alike.
For the cosmetic dinner, the WHCA will also bring back a Secret Service member who survived the shooting in April, when 31-year-old Cole Thomas Allen, who allegedly intended to target multiple Trump administration officials, was arrested near the screening area outside the banquet hall after getting past a security checkpoint. Additionally, Washington Hilton employees who remained at the scene and continued to care for troubled guests were honored.
Elements of the first supper remain. Prizes were distributed. Mentalist Oz Perlman, who got just one special trick for the White House press secretary at the first dinner before gunshots wreaked havoc, is back to provide some fun; Before the event, a group of hundreds of former journalists and press freedom groups sent a letter to the World Press Association. Now, they were urging the association to capitalize on Trump’s presence by criticizing his administration’s attacks on First Amendment rights, which include a recent subpoena New York Times Journalists for their coverage and the threat of canceling broadcasters’ licenses.
The president took the stage around 9:30 PM ET and spoke about the attempted attack early in his long-awaited speech, which was highly speculated on in April and again before the July event. Traditionally, dinner speeches are a critique of those in attendance and the president himself.
“The attempted mass murder at the Washington Hilton — that is what it could have been — was an assault on our democracy itself,” Trump said. “A very dangerous situation. Many of you were there with me, and some showed extreme courage, like Pete Hegseth, Steve Miller, and Tom Holman. Really, they were standing on the tables. And most of you were under the table,” he told the audience Friday night, drawing some laughter.
After some rancorous admiration for the press and constitutional freedom of speech, the idea of a third Trump term, the White House stateroom project, and Robert Kennedy Jr. mowing down the cow served at dinner in his car were among Trump’s early jokes. They got a new laugh, but his first completely dropped laugh came soon and involved the rapper and MAGA mutant who was with him recently at a White House event.
“After hearing the gunshots, many people shouted: ‘Get down! Get down!” which made Nicki Minaj start dancing,” he said, referring to the dance. “Can you believe it? Get down. She’s the only one who really understood what that meant.”
Trump’s speech began meandering as he initially reminisced about his memories of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in the 1980s and moved on to a number of topics and name-dropped celebrities not in the room and with whom he has personal grievances, some dating back decades. Rosie O’Donnell, Bette Midler and Bruce Springsteen were all mentioned, with the latter’s aging appearance compared to that of the President. Trump joked that his live show, where he attacked the administration’s policies, was now called “Boredom in the USA.”
The camera captured the attendees in footage that was previously broadcast live news agency He appeared bored and irritated as Trump’s speech passed the 20-minute mark, and it was clear that this was not going to be the typical Trump on-air diatribe some had expected, but another Trump-complaining broadcast that was filled with some jokes that landed with a thud.
Even the president criticized some of the jokes when they didn’t make them laugh. At one point, he referred to the “Chicago governor,” supposedly billionaire Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, while discussing an organized fight between politicians.
“I’d like to say I could mention the governor of Chicago, but instead I’ll mention Jerry Nadler, and they’re fighting for a big piece of cheesecake, a big piece of cheesecake,” he said without any audible laughter. “Who the hell wrote that line?”
While airing part of his speech on injustices at the Night of Celebrating Journalists, Trump, predictably, attacked journalists for unfair treatment, specifically mentioning CNN anchors Kaitlan Collins (an awardee honored earlier in the night) and Jake Tapper (multiple winner of the Merriman Smith Award for White House Correspondents).
After mentioning late-night hosts Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert, whom he described as talentless, Trump also admitted that he really hates some people.
“They considered going with a professional clown for entertainment, but Adam “Shifty” Schiff wasn’t available,” Trump joked. “You know he’s known – I hate some people. You know, I shouldn’t say surprise. I’m not supposed to hate him. I’m supposed to love everyone, but he’s a terrible person. He’s a liar, and I called him Watermelon Head because he’s got the biggest head I’ve ever seen with the smallest neck, a pencil neck. How’s that big fat ugly head standing on a little pencil, pencil, pencil neck?”
After about an hour of a speech that quickly turned bad and included some funny lines, Trump eagerly ended his speech by praising the journalists in the room and their profession.
“We have the hottest country anywhere in the world, and we will continue to do so,” he said. “And I just want to say, this is a room where I have the greatest respect for the people in this room. Sometimes I don’t feel like you’re treating me fair. Maybe you feel that way. I don’t know. I don’t feel that way. But sometimes you treat me very fair, and I have great respect for your craft. Your craft is amazing. And I just want to thank you for having me. And it was fun.”
