Overview
- Trump, who is set to speak Saturday night, will attend the White House Correspondents’ Dinner for the first time as president after accepting the WHCA invitation in March.
- The WHCA dropped the traditional comic headliner and booked mentalist Oz Pearlman, and the program will still present awards, including a Wall Street Journal honor tied to reporting on a Jeffrey Epstein letter.
- A petition signed by more than 250 veteran journalists and advocacy groups called Trump’s presence a contradiction of the dinner’s mission, while WHCA president Weijia Jiang defended hosting the event as a First Amendment celebration.
- Late-night shows leaned into cultural pushback Thursday, with Jimmy Kimmel staging an “alternative” roast of Trump on TV and Stephen Colbert lampooning the planned appearance with a Trump impression.
- The dinner unfolds against an adversarial backdrop that includes the administration barring the Associated Press from some events and a 2025 appeals court ruling allowing limits on AP access while litigation proceeds.