A thin-skinned President Donald Trump, who responds to criticisms of him with attack tweets through Twitter, chickened out of getting roasted at the annual White House Correspondents Association dinner this year.
In a tweet Saturday, Trump wrote: “I will not be attending the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner this year. Please wish everyone well and have a great evening!” He gave no reason for not attending.
Trump has long had an adversarial relationship with news media has stepped up his criticism by accusing some prominent news outlets of publishing “fake news” and calling them “the enemy of the American People!”
Trump had been a regular at the WHCA dinner in recent years as a reality TV star and beauty pageant owner. He skipped the dinner in 2016, which came amid the presidential campaign and was the last of the dinners in which President Barack Obama was the honored guest.
Trump was still the butt of jokes. At one point Obama told guests that Trump “has spent years meeting with leaders from around the world — Miss Sweden, Miss Argentina, Miss Azerbaijan.”
If he attended the dinner Trump would be a prime target of jokes, the camera showing his reaction to one-liners. In 2011, he was on hand — and appeared humiliated — as Obama lobbed joke after joke at his expense. At the time Trump was a proponent of the debunked claim that Obama wasn’t born in the U.S.
In a statement following Trump’s tweet, WHCA President Jeff Mason said: “The WHCA takes note of President Donald Trump’s announcement on Twitter that he does not plan to attend the dinner, which has been and will continue to be a celebration of the First Amendment and the important role played by an independent news media in a healthy republic.”
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2 thoughts on “Trump won’t face the jokes at press dinner”
“Trump won’t face the jokes at press dinner”
The man is a joke!
Awwww. Poor Donny Wonny can’t take the heat. So, taking Charlie Brown’s position, “A problem isn’t big enough or complicated enough, that it can’t be run away from,” poor English aside. Such a poor baby. We should all feel sorry for him and “give him a chance.” He’s had more than one “chance.”
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