President Donald Trump used the White House Correspondents' Association dinner on Friday to take swipes at the media and joke about a third term. The rescheduled event was held at the Waldorf Astoria, a few miles from the Washington Hilton where the first dinner was cancelled after a shooting three months earlier.
Trump said, "As I said three months ago, the show must go on," and added, "Just like my presidency, the second time is always better – and the third time will be better yet … I'm only kidding," before revealing a Trump 2028 cap at the end of his remarks. He also stood and shook hands with award winners, including Victor Gonzalez of the US Secret Service, who was shot at the scene in April and received an award for his actions that night.
Weijia Jiang at the Waldorf Astoria
Weijia Jiang said the event would return to the Washington Hilton next year and said she would refuse to let an act of violence have the final word. The shift in venue followed criticism that security at the Washington Hilton was inadequate after the earlier attack, so the rescheduled dinner moved the gathering but did not alter its purpose.
Trump used the room to praise the media and said he respects "most of them," while also delivering pointed insults to several journalists, Democratic politicians and celebrities. He said, "We settle our differences not with bullets, but with open and vigorous debate," and added, "And no deranged loser with a gun will ever change that. We can't let that ever happen," tying the dinner back to the shooting that interrupted the first attempt.
White House Correspondents' Dinner remarks
He also said, "This place [the dinner] is really the largest group of 'Trump derangement syndrome' people ever put together at one time," and followed with, "I suspect some of you are lucky that our last dinner was cut short...I was going to go after you," in front of White House Correspondents, award recipients and reporters from, and the. A team received an award for coverage of Trump's links to Jeffrey Epstein, placing the criticism and the honors in the same room.
The dinner returned after a cancellation that began with violence, but the hands Trump shook and the cap he displayed made the night more than a routine press event. Whether his third-term joke was political intent or just a joke was left unanswered by the remarks themselves.
