Donald Trump is planning a pointed attack on the press at this Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, then making a quick exit before the evening’s press awards are handed out. A White House insider has leaked the plan, and the president is not holding back.
According to The Daily Beast, Trump intends to use his dinner speech to go after specific media outlets he has accused of unfair coverage, particularly in relation to his administration’s war with Iran. Sources say the president has described the planned moment as a “revenge” attack, after which he will walk out rather than sit through the rest of the program.
The timing of his departure is no accident. Trump has told aides he will not be in the room when the Wall Street Journal receives the Katherine Graham award for its reporting on a letter Trump allegedly wrote for Jeffrey Epstein’s 50th birthday. A federal judge tossed Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Journal over that story just last week.
Trump skips the roast, again
This will be the first time Trump has attended the WHCA dinner as a sitting president, having skipped every edition during his first term and again last year. He last showed up as a guest in 2011, when then-President Barack Obama used his dinner speech to mock Trump’s birther conspiracy theories. The moment visibly rattled Trump, and many observers have long credited that evening as a turning point that pushed him toward a presidential run.
This year, there will be no comedian on stage to roast him. The WHCA replaced its usual comedy act with mentalist Oz Pearlman, a move Variety noted is part of the organization’s ongoing effort to navigate its complicated relationship with a president who has declared the press the “enemy of the people.” Trump’s team is aware of the entertainment swap and still plans to leave before the show begins, per the insider cited by The Daily Beast.
Some aides have also reportedly floated a more provocative idea: dropping a major announcement related to the Iran War the morning after the dinner, timing it to disrupt the press while reporters are still recovering from the night’s festivities. The suggestion was framed as a nod to 2011, when Obama quietly finalized the Osama bin Laden raid on the same night he publicly roasted Trump at the very same event.
Pressure mounts on the press corps
Trump’s attendance has sparked a backlash from press freedom groups. Hundreds of veteran journalists and major journalism organizations sent an open letter to WHCA president Weijia Jiang, the CBS News White House correspondent, urging the association to use the evening to deliver a forceful defense of the First Amendment directly in front of the president.
Some attendees plan to wear pocket squares or lapel pins printed with the text of the First Amendment as a silent form of protest.
The dinner also arrives at a fraught moment for several major media companies. CBS parent Paramount recently settled Trump’s lawsuit against the network for $16 million, a move widely seen as an attempt to smooth the way for regulatory approval of a pending acquisition. The evening is shaping up to be one of the most politically charged WHCA events in recent memory, and Trump has made clear he plans to make the most of his time at the microphone.
Trump has previously dismissed criticism of his administration as politically motivated, and his public statements on faith and values have also drawn scrutiny in recent weeks. Saturday’s dinner will be watched closely to see whether his speech lives up to the advance billing from his own team.
