The room was silent for much of the speech. Even the White House efforts to stuff the venue with cabinet members and West Wing aides didn’t save Donald Trump from bombing. After he stumbled through the Christie cake riff, the camera cut to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who sat stone-faced. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt had promised the speech would be “unifying” and “vicious.”
At moments, it was one of those things. Trump attacked Chuck Schumer, using “Palestinian” as a slur to mock the New York senator. He fixated on CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins’ looks, instructing her to smile more before delivering a clumsy joke comparing her to trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney. He said Ilhan Omar should “get out of our country.” The ballroom remained mostly totally silent. When the camera cut to the room, attendees sat stone-faced or looked at their phones.
Trump seemed aware he was bombing. He repeatedly asked the silent crowd who had written his speech. After delivering an incomprehensible joke about a senator having sex with his wife, Trump tried to explain the punchline before asking the audience: “Does anybody get that? I thought that was actually pretty good. That was actually the only thing I thought was good in this whole freaking stupid speech.”
It may be unfair to blame the speechwriters, a team led by Ross Worthington that back in April had input from roast comic Tony Hinchcliffe. On Friday night, Trump’s delivery often appeared to be the problem. He sometimes stopped in the middle of pre-written jokes to riff about his perceived enemies, so much so that by the time he delivered the punchline it was unclear what the setup was. That kind of extemporaneous grievance-association may thrill the MAGA hat-wearing denizens of a Trump rally, but in a room full of journalists it fell uncomfortably flat.
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The WHCA has drawn criticism for hosting Trump at the dinner. Days before, a group of 500 journalists, including Ann Curry and Jim Acosta, signed an open letter calling on the WHCA to “forcefully demonstrate opposition to President Trump’s efforts to trample freedom of the press.” CBS News Senior White House Correspondent and WHCA president Weijia Jiang, in an interview with C-SPAN, called the letter “disappointing” and said it was “based on the premise that we weren’t going to say anything about the current environment, and that’s a false premise.”
There were thinly veiled efforts throughout the night to impress upon Trump the importance of the press. There was this pointed remark: “The government doesn’t get to shut the press up, not when it’s wrong, not when it’s annoying, and not when it’s asking uncomfortable questions.”
That was Thomas Jefferson. Well, not really. It was an AI video of Thomas Jefferson that aired in the middle of the dinner. The selection of Jefferson to deliver this message was likely no accident. Trump is fond of the third president; his portrait hangs in the Oval Office, framed in gold, and last week Trump installed a bronze statue of Jefferson in the Rose Garden.
The video continued hammering the theme. It featured clips of Trump arguing with reporters, including his infamous clash with Jim Acosta. It featured clips of Trump’s predecessors, from Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush to Barack Obama, extolling the value of journalists that cover the powerful. Ken Burns appeared to point out that “Jefferson famously championed a free press.” AI Jefferson stepped back in to admonish his predecessor, AI John Adams, for trying to crack down on journalists. AI John Adams looked chastened.
