White House Correspondents’ Dinner returns two years later, with Joe Biden and Trevor Noah | Globalism

The White House Correspondents Association Welcomes President we for an annual gala dinner since 1924. However, the event has not been held in recent years. Donald Trump He avoided dinner because he considered journalists his enemies, and after Trump, there was Covid-19.

Having 2,600 guests at the Washington Hilton marks a return to normal.

• Trump avoids dinner with reporters at the White House for the second year
• Biden will spend less time at reporters’ dinner to avoid exposure to Covid-19

The president and the jokes are back, while the gloves and masks are gone at the Correspondents’ Association dinner.

President Joe Biden He joked about his low popularity, and mocked his predecessor Donald Trump He was criticized by the host of the night, comedian Trevor Noah, at a party in which Washington politicians, journalists and Hollywood names mingled.

The night was also marked by serious references to the conflict in Ukraine and the challenges to democracy and press freedom at home and abroad.

“I’m so happy to be here tonight with the only American group that got a lower approval rating than me,” Biden said.

Biden admitted that the past few years have been difficult. “We had a terrible epidemic, followed by two years of Covid,” he said.

Comments became more serious shortly thereafter, praising the work of journalists who covered the war in Ukraine and warning of “a poison penetrating our democracy, as disinformation grows.”

“Your free press is more important than at any time in this century,” Biden said.

The dinner also praised the sacrifices of journalists in war zones.

As the pandemic continues to spread, some have questioned the 79-year-old president’s existence after Vice President Kamala Harris tested positive for Covid last week.

Biden avoided the meal as a precaution, but he did not wear a mask.

“Trevor, the really good news is that you can now criticize the boss we“And unlike Moscow, you don’t go to prison,” Biden said when introducing the comedian.

Noah opened his speech by saying that he was honored to be the host of “the country’s most exclusive event”.

The comedian mocked inflation in the United States. He stated that the reporters “have been tough on you (Biden), which I don’t understand, since you took office, things are getting better – you know, the gas has gone up, the rent has gone up, the food has gone up. Everything.”

Biden, who laughed throughout Noah’s performance, seemed to want to make a difference with Trump, who not only never attended dinner but called journalists “enemies of the people.”

The last WHCA dinner, before the pandemic, was in 2019, without the president in attendance. The year before, comedian Michelle Wolf’s jokes angered Trump’s press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

Noah took the opportunity to pay tribute to the journalists and described the right to a free press as a “blessing.”

“Ask yourself this question: If Russian journalists who have lost their liberty for daring to report what their government is doing, if they had what you have, would they use it in the same way you do?”

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