Correspondents Dinner Will Be Different This Year

President Trump plans to end his yearslong absence from the White House Correspondents' Association dinner and attend this year's event, scheduled for April 25. In a post Monday on his Truth Social platform, Trump said he would go "in honor of our Nation's 250th Birthday" because, he claimed, journalists now acknowledge him as "one of the Greatest Presidents" and the "G.O.A.T." He wrote that he intends to help make the dinner the "greatest" and "most spectacular" of its kind, the Hill reports. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt amplified the announcement by reposting it on X, adding, "Will be fun!"

His decision to stay away broke with a long tradition of sitting presidents attending the event as honorees. The last time he appeared at the dinner was in 2015, before he was elected; he was also the target of pointed jokes by then-President Obama at the 2011 dinner over Trump's promotion of the false "birther" claim about Obama's birthplace. There may be fewer zings to worry about this year, the Guardian points out: Mentalist Oz Pearlman, instead of a comedian, will host.