“The President and members of his administration will not attend the White House Correspondents Dinner this year.”

President Donald Trump announced a few weeks ago he will boycott the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, which will take place this weekend.

He has now ordered White House officials to also boycott the event.

When Trump made his decision, he called the dinner boring and negative. He decided “to hold a very positive rally” and promised it will “be big.”

From The Washington Examiner:

The boycott comes weeks after news organizations invited White House staff and other administration officials to join their tables at the ritzy annual gathering at the Washington Hilton, where tickets cost $300 per seat. “The President and members of his administration will not attend the White House Correspondents Dinner this year,” a White House official told the Washington Examiner in an email. “Instead, Saturday evening President Trump will travel to Green Bay, Wisconsin where he will hold a campaign rally.” Earlier in the day, White House Cabinet Secretary Bill McGinley announced that all administration officials were ordered by Trump to skip the dinner, multiple outlets reported.

Olivier Knox, president of the White House Correspondents Association responded:

Response to news reports of a Trump-ordered boycott of the Correspondents’ Dinner: #We’re looking forward to an enjoyable evening of celebrating the First Amendment and great journalists past, present, and future.” – Olivier Knox, President of the #WHCA — WHCA (@whca) April 23, 2019

The dinner, often called Nerd Prom, should celebrate the First Amendment and press freedom, while recognizing “outstanding journalism from the previous year and uses proceeds from the dinner to fund scholarships for aspiring journalists.”

Instead, it has turned into a lavish social event. Journalists invite celebrities, which many “have said detracts from the dinner’s mission.” Plus, I don’t like the idea of journalists cozying up to the politicians they need to report on. The idea makes me uncomfortable.

It doesn’t help that the comedians who have performed at the dinner have gone after Republicans “sometimes in profane terms, giving the event a partisan cast.”

That is why the boycott does not surprise me. Comedian Michelle Wolf received criticism from both sides after she made fun of Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

This year, author Ron Chernow will address the dinner. His 2010 book Washington: A Life won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Biography and the 2011 American History Book Prize. He received rave reviews and other nominations for biographies on Alexander Hamilton and John D. Rockefeller.



