President Donald Trump returned to the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner Friday night. It was a rescheduled event, three months after a gunman disrupted the original gathering. What followed was a long, rambling speech that left many in the room unsure how to react.
The dinner was originally set for April 25 at the Washington Hilton. That night was interrupted when a gunman crashed through security in an apparent assassination attempt on Trump. The suspect was caught and charged. The event got postponed and moved to a new venue, the Waldorf Astoria, once known as the Trump International Hotel.
Trump opened his remarks by nodding to that history, telling the crowd the show must go on. He said the speech he had planned for April would have been a doozy, and that he’d since toned it down.
Confused about the tone
Early in his remarks, Trump admitted he wasn’t sure what kind of speech to give. He wondered aloud whether the night called for humor, seriousness, or something else entirely. At one point he asked the crowd directly if he was supposed to be a comedian.
That confusion set the tone for the rest of the evening. Trump’s delivery was described as halting and unfocused, closer to a ramble than his usual freewheeling style, which he has called “the weave.”
Bashing the press
Despite the uncertain start, Trump quickly returned to familiar territory. He complained about the journalism awards handed out earlier in the evening, noting that many had gone to reporters whose coverage of his administration has been critical. He asked the crowd if he got a say in who won.
Then he went on to call out specific journalists by name, including CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and the Wall Street Journal’s Josh Dawsey. He also referred to the gathering as a room full of people suffering from what he called Trump Derangement Syndrome.
Trump made jokes about the weight and intelligence of unnamed public figures during his hourlong address. He also brought up his lack of an Emmy win for “The Apprentice,” a sore point often cited among his critics online.
Talk of a third term
Near the end of his speech, Trump joked about running for a fourth term and put on a hat reading “Trump 2028.” He also repeated his false claim that he won the 2020 election, a claim that has been repeatedly disproven.
He said he intends to return to the correspondents’ dinner again in 2027.
Rising tension with the press
The dinner took place against a backdrop of growing friction between Trump and the media. His administration has pressured news outlets in several ways this year, including sanctions on members of the White House press corps, regulatory action through the Federal Communications Commission, and lawsuits against media companies.
This year’s dinner also broke from tradition in another way. Instead of a stand-up comedian, the WHCA booked mentalist Oz Pearlman to perform. That decision followed last year’s controversy, when comedian Amber Ruffin’s invitation to headline was pulled after pushback from the administration.
Outgoing WHCA president Weijia Jiang, a senior White House correspondent for CBS News, gave opening remarks before Trump took the stage.