Overview
- The White House Correspondents' Association held a scaled-down redo of the dinner on July 24 at the Waldorf Astoria after an April 25 shooting forced the original event to be canceled and moved venues.
- Security was visibly ramped up with street closures, single-entry screening and airport-style checks as the Secret Service said it had strengthened plans and conducted an advance team sweep for the July event.
- President Trump spoke for more than an hour, mixing limited praise for reporters with repeated insults of named journalists and political rivals, and closed by placing a red “Trump 2028” hat on his head.
- The WHCA presented major awards to reporters including a Wall Street Journal team and CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and honored Secret Service officer Victor Gonzales and Washington Hilton staff for their response to the April attack; the Justice Department had withdrawn subpoenas for some New York Times reporters days earlier.
- A contested lipreader transcription of a whispered exchange is being reported but remains unverified and developing, and coverage noted a smaller, often muted audience reaction that highlighted tensions over press access and security going forward.