President Donald Trump was forced to sit through the White House Correspondents’ Dinner as he was roasted about press freedom and America being a country of “no kings.”
Three months after the annual WHCA dinner was postponed after an attempted assassination against the president, a scaled-back redo was held on Friday night after the reality TV star-turned-president insisted the show must go on.
But in a somewhat humiliating moment for the octogenarian, the event kicked off with a lengthy video featuring journalists talking about the First Amendment, an AI image of Founding Father James Madison talking about the nation not being ruled by kings, and footage of Trump at various events calling the media “fake news.”
“Hello from 1789. I’m James Madison,” the AI version of the former president said as the current president watched on.
“Yes, that James Madison. I wrote the First Amendment. At the time, we worried a king might control the press. Turns out you’re now worried about tweets, algorithms, and people yelling on television. Let me clarify the rule: the government doesn’t get to shut the press up, not when it’s wrong, not when it’s annoying, and not when it’s asking uncomfortable questions.”
This year’s dinner was the first time Trump has attended since 2015, weeks before he launched his first presidential campaign.
The mood was noticeably different from the April event, which was derailed moments into the dinner after 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen stormed a security checkpoint and opened fire outside the ballroom where Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, and the administration’s Cabinet members were seated alongside thousands of journalists and other guests.
The first lady, who was filmed looking terrified as she hid under the table after the shots rang out, opted not to attend Friday night’s event.
JD Vance, who has just had his fourth child, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has been touring Southeast Asia for the past few days, were also absent.
There was also less glitz and glamor, with no red carpet and no full week of pre-dinner parties and events that have become a staple of the annual gathering.
But the inevitable tension between the media and a president who has spent years portraying journalists as enemies of the state, suing news organizations, and using the machinery of government to pressure the media was evident.
Some journalists opted not to attend the event, while others, including the Daily Beast, did so in order to report on it.
Security was also heavily beefed up, with fencing and barricades across downtown D.C., a high police presence, and tighter protocols. Unlike the paper tickets from the earlier dinner, attendees also had to present a unique QR code with a government-issued photo ID to get through ticketing, and go through layers of security to enter the ballroom.
The event nonetheless took place amid a heightened threat environment. According to the Secret Service, nationwide threats have reached an unprecedented level, with agents opening roughly 10,000 protective intelligence cases since January—a nearly 40 percent increase from the same period last year.
The Association also gave The Wall Street Journal a coveted journalism award for “courage and accountability” for its coverage of the Jeffrey Epstein files—and for its reporting on a lewd birthday card Trump allegedly sent to the child sex predator for his 50th birthday.
Trump has vehemently denied writing the letter, which was sent in 2003 and features a drawing of a naked woman with his name mimicking pubic hair.
He also filed a $10 billion lawsuit against the publication, which was dismissed by a federal judge in April after it failed to meet the legal “actual malice” standard required for public figures.
Trump congratulated the journalists he had tried to sue, and then threw his hands up in the air, sparking laughs from the audience.
