Trump will return to a dinner celebrating the press corps he often attacks

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to press ahead of departing Washington on the South Lawn of the White House. (Annabelle Gordon for The Washington Post/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

In the same way that U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term is unlike any other, this weekend’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner will be unlike any other.

Trump will be attending the gala for the first time as president and speaking before thousands of journalists and politicos — leaving attendees to wonder what he’ll say and how the room will react.

Will the president use a dinner dedicated to the First Amendment to attack journalists and air his well-worn grievances? Or will he deliver the barbs with a lighter touch, perhaps in the joking, back-slapping manner he sometimes adopts around reporters?

A wide range of critics say the soirée risks normalizing Trump’s anti-democratic assaults on the press. Trump’s presence at the event is “a profound contradiction of its purpose,” a petition signed by 250-plus veteran journalists and several media advocacy groups said earlier this week.

But the journalists who invited him, the board of the White House Correspondents’ Association, say they are glad Trump is ending a years-long boycott of the dinner and embracing a tradition that dates back one hundred years. The association has been inviting the sitting president to the dinner ever since former U.S. president Calvin Coolidge attended in 1924.

Members of the association, which says it exists to “facilitate robust coverage of the presidency,” note that the black-tie function doubles as an award ceremony for the association and a fundraiser for its scholarship program.

This year’s president of the WHCA, Weijia Jiang, senior White House correspondent for CBS News, said “there is no confusion about what this dinner is about.”

“Everyone in attendance has chosen to be there knowing that it is a dinner dedicated to recognizing the importance of the First Amendment,” she told CNN. “Especially as we mark America’s 250th birthday, our decision to gather — as journalists, newsmakers and the president in the same room — is a reminder of what the free press means in this country.”

Jiang will give remarks about the essential role of the press corps, as is customary for the association’s president. Attendees will likely be watching the president’s face carefully for his reactions.

In past years, the association president has been followed by the commander-in-chief, and then a headliner, usually a comedian who roasts everyone in the room. This year, the association booked mentalist Oz Pearlman rather than a comedian, partly to sidestep the potential backlash a comedic performance can cause.

“My job is to bring us together,” Pearlman told NPR.

It is unclear if the usual format is going to be followed this year. Trump may opt not to be on stage during the presentation of journalism awards.

The parties and the protests

The dinner, which will be televised live by CNN and other channels, is the centrepiece of the weekend’s social calendar, surrounded by more than a dozen brunches, ceremonies, receptions and late-night parties.

Attendees generally say the gladhanding and networking can be valuable in a city that runs on tips and leaks. But the appearance of reporters and politicians yukking it up together generates criticism every year, all the more so this time because Trump is attending.

Ron Fournier, a former D.C. bureau chief of The Associated Press, acknowledged the tension in a recent essay.

“Yes, the industry’s best reporters will be honored Saturday night with prizes for their work uncovering wrongdoing inside the Trump administration, and the dinner raises money for college scholarships. This is the good work of the WHCA,” Fournier wrote. “But why celebrate journalism alongside a man whose concept of news travels the narrow range between ‘Trump is a great president’ to ‘Trump is the greatest president ever’? Why celebrate journalism with a man who hates it?”

A handful of journalists who publish on YouTube and Substack have gained publicity by pointedly saying they will not join the festivities on Saturday.

And HuffPost, which has sent staffers to the dinner for the past 17 years, has also garnered attention for skipping this year.

Trump’s entire presidency is “an affront to a free press,” editor in chief Whitney Snyder wrote. “He has unleashed the FCC on his critics, punished publications for exercising their First Amendment rights, threatened to jail journalists and used the law as a tool of intimidation.”

He dismissed the idea “of raising a glass to the power of journalism with him” as “ridiculous and embarrassing.”

But HuffPost is the exception to the rule. The dinner, always a jam-packed affair in the belly of the Washington Hilton, is completely sold out of tables this year. Despite that, many media outlets were still asking to buy more tickets in the days leading up to the event.

The list of pre- and post-dinner parties is also longer than usual this year. Trump attended one of them on Thursday night: A dinner hosted by Paramount, which is awaiting Trump administration approval for its bid to buy CNN’s parent Warner Bros. Discovery.

The dinner invite said Paramount would be “honoring the Trump White House and CBS White House correspondents.” Anti-Trump and anti-Paramount protesters held signs and wore costumes outside the event on Thursday evening.

Why Trump’s showing up

Some analysts have speculated that Trump accepted the WHCA’s invite this year to spike the football in front of a deflated press corps.

However, some beat reporters argue that Trump’s attendance is a concession of sorts — an acknowledgment of the press corps’ enduring power.

Despite Trump’s almost endless stream of threats and taunts, as well as his administration’s actions to undermine news coverage, the White House press corps is still doing the day-in, day-out work of informing the public about the presidency.

During her term as president of the WHCA, Jiang has sought to repair strained relations with the White House press office, and Trump’s appearance at the dinner may be a mark of success.

But of course, the association’s leaders don’t know what to expect from Trump, or even how long he will speak.

Trump has hired joke writers, according to his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, who recently said on a podcast that “I think everyone should get ready because he’s going to do some roasting, and we know that he doesn’t hold anything back.”

She acknowledged that Trump’s previous appearance at a WHCA dinner in 2011 is now the stuff of political legend. Trump was the butt of several stinging jokes made by both former U.S. president Barack Obama and comedian Seth Meyers.

“That evening of public abasement” accelerated Trump’s “ferocious efforts to gain stature in the political world,” Maggie Haberman and Alex Burns wrote for The New York Times in 2016.

Trump, however, told Roxanne Roberts of The Washington Post, one of his dinnermates that night, “I had a phenomenal time. I had a great evening.”

This year, Jiang said, none of the association’s members have complained to her about Trump’s expected attendance. Some view it as a positive development, given his past boycotts.

Reporters “are looking forward to the president’s attendance,” she said.

“We cover the White House,” she added. “And when you cover any subject, you want to be around your subject.”

By Brian Stelter, CNN