{"id":208867,"date":"2026-04-26T00:40:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T00:40:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-set-to-attend-his-first-white-house-correspondents-dinner-as-president-nbc-news\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T00:40:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T00:40:23","slug":"trump-set-to-attend-his-first-white-house-correspondents-dinner-as-president-nbc-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-set-to-attend-his-first-white-house-correspondents-dinner-as-president-nbc-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump set to attend his first White House Correspondents' Dinner as president – NBC News"},"content":{"rendered":"

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President Donald Trump is attending White House Correspondents\u2019 Association dinner for<\/a> the first time as commander-in-chief, surrounded by the journalists he routinely berates<\/a> and threatens<\/a>.
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Until now, Trump had been the only president in the event\u2019s centurylong history not to attend at least once while in office. In years past, presidents have typically endured a light roasting from the dinner\u2019s headliner, typically a comedian.
This year, the correspondents\u2019 association opted to book mentalist Oz Pearlman. The association also didn\u2019t have a comedian perform last year, instead focusing on its journalism awards.
Trump “is very, very good at holding his cards close, and I think he’s also a showman, if ever there was one, who knows the power of a great headline,” Pearlman told C-SPAN on the possibility of working his act on the president, adding that he would hope to create “an amazing moment that will unite this country.”
The dinner comes amid the backdrop of war with Iran,<\/a> which has led to higher gas prices around the world and volatility in the stock market. It also comes as Trump\u2019s approval rating hit a new low in a recent NBC News poll<\/a>, with 37% of respondents approving of his job performance and 63% disapproving. Trump was well underwater on his handling of inflation and the cost of living, with 68% saying they disapproved of his policies. The slide also extends to Trump\u2019s handling of the Iran war, with 67% of respondents disapproving.
The gala is meant to celebrate the nation\u2019s most dogged White House reporting, but Trump\u2019s turn as guest of honor will give him another opportunity to air his grievances with the journalists who cover him. He has clashed with reporters during his time in office, though he\u2019s taken m<\/a>ore aggressive steps<\/a> during his second term by limiting access for traditional media while boosting conservative and pro-Trump outlets.
“It’s going to be classic President Trump,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told CNN on the red carpet inside the Washington Hilton Hotel. “There will be some comedy throughout. There will be some jabs thrown. I think it’s appropriate for a night like this.”
“I’m anticipating that the president is going to put on a big performance and probably offend some people,” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told C-SPAN before the event.
Trump feuded with The Associated Press last year over its refusal to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America in its stories. The White House then barred the AP from major presidential events, prompting a lawsuit from the news agency. In June 2025, a U.S. appeals court ruled<\/a> that Trump could ban the AP from some media events as the case proceeded.
Trump also filed a $15 billion defamation lawsuit against The New York Times over its coverage of his 2024 campaign; a federal judge tossed the lawsuit<\/a> in September, but he refiled it weeks later.<\/a>
Earlier this month, a judge tossed a $10 billion lawsuit<\/a> Trump filed against The Wall Street Journal over its publication of a bawdy 50th birthday card he is alleged to have sent to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. Trump has denied writing the letter.
Now, Trump could be present as Journal reporters receive an award<\/a> Saturday night for their reporting on Epstein\u2019s birthday card.
The Trump White House\u2019s adversarial relationship with the press extends down the management chain. Earlier this month, FBI Director Kash Patel filed a lawsuit<\/a> against The Atlantic over a story alleging he drank to excess and had unexplained absences from the bureau\u2019s headquarters. In his lawsuit, Patel denied the allegations.
The FBI in January <\/a>searched a Washington Post reporter\u2019s home and seized her phone and laptops <\/a>as part of an investigation into a government contractor accused of mishandling classified information. <\/a>A judge in February blocked the DOJ <\/a>from using material it found on the reporter\u2019s devices as part of its case.
In March, the Defense Department removed media offices<\/a> from the Pentagon after a federal judge sided with The New York Times, which had sued over new rules requiring journalists to sign a pledge restricting their ability to gather reporting. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has described U.S. media as \u201cincredibly unpatriotic.\u201d<\/a>
A fixture of Washington\u2019s spring social calendar, the dinner raises funds for the correspondents\u2019 association, as well as several journalism scholarships.
Hundreds of journalists and their guests attend each year, but the gala has drawn criticism from others. This year, a coalition of journalism groups, as well as journalists like former CBS News anchor Dan Rather and former CNN White House reporter Jim Acosta, signed a letter<\/a> to the correspondents\u2019 association calling on it to \u201cforcefully demonstrate opposition to President Trump\u2019s efforts to trample freedom of the press.\u201d
\u201cThere is a long tradition of presidents attending the White House Correspondents Association Dinner,\u201d the letter said. \u201cBut these are not normal times, and this cannot be business as usual with the press standing up to applaud the man who attacks them on a daily basis.\u201d
When Trump announced<\/a> in March that he would attend the 2026 dinner, the correspondents\u2019 association said it was \u201chappy\u201d the president accepted the invitation.
\u201cFor more than 100 years, the journalists of the White House Correspondents\u2019 Association have enjoyed an evening with the president, a dinner that celebrates the First Amendment while supporting the work we do including awards honoring excellent journalism and scholarships to help the next generation of reporters who someday will be the ones asking the questions at the White House,\u201d the group\u2019s president, Weijia Jiang, said in a statement<\/a> at the time.
Trump\u2019s attendance appears to give the green light for others in his orbit to go to the dinner as well. Taylor Budowich, a longtime Trump adviser and former deputy chief of staff at the White House, is set to attend with The Associated Press, despite the AP\u2019s ongoing legal battles with the administration.
\u201cAs a fan or irony, I\u2019ll be with The Associated Press,\u201d Budowich said Friday at an event<\/a> hosted by Axios.
Trump may be attending the dinner for the first time as president, but he\u2019s been in the audience before.
In 2011, then-President Barack Obama and comedian Seth Meyers famously ribbed<\/a> a stone-faced Trump over his fixation on Obama\u2019s long-form birth certificate. Less than a month later, Trump announced that he wouldn\u2019t run in the 2012 presidential election, but the incident is seen as a marker<\/a> in the political transformation that culminated in his 2016 electoral victory.
Casey Wooten is a breaking news editor for the politics team at NBC News.
© 2026 NBCUniversal Media, LLC<\/p>\n

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news AlertsThere are no new alerts at this timePresident Donald Trump is attending White House Correspondents\u2019 Association dinner for the first time as commander-in-chief, surrounded by the journalists he routinely berates and threatens.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.Until now, Trump had been the only president in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":208868,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-208867","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}