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The White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) annual dinner, begun in 1921, traditionally held on the evening of the last Saturday in April at the Washington Hilton, has become a Washington, D.C. tradition, and is attended by the president and vice president.

Until 1962, the dinner was open only to men, even though WHCA’s membership included women. At the urging of Helen Thomas, President John F. Kennedy refused to attend the dinner unless the ban on women was dropped. Prior to World War II, the annual dinner featured singing between courses, a homemade movie, and an hour-long, post-dinner show with big-name performers. Since 1983, the featured speaker has usually been a comedian, with the dinner taking on the form of a comedy roast of the president and his administration. The dinner also funds scholarships for gifted students in college journalism programs. Many annual dinners have been cancelled or downsized due to deaths or political crises. The dinner was cancelled in 1930 due to the death of former president William Howard Taft; in 1942, following the United States’ entry into World War II; and in 1951, over what President Harry S. Truman called the “uncertainty of the world situation.” In 1981, Ronald Reagan did not attend because he was recuperating after the attempted assassination the previous month, but he did phone in and told a joke about the shooting. During his first presidency, Donald Trump did not attend the dinners in 2017, 2018, and 2019. Trump indicated that he might attend in 2019 since this dinner did not feature a comedian as the featured speaker. However, on April 5, 2019, he announced that he again would not attend, calling the dinner “so boring, and so negative,” instead hosting a political rally that evening in Wisconsin.

On April 22, Trump ordered a boycott of the dinner, with White House Cabinet Secretary Bill McGinley assembling the agencies’ chiefs of staff to issue a directive that members of the administration not attend. However, some members of the administration attended pre- and post-dinner parties. After the April 30, 2022 dinner, several attendees, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, tested positive for COVID-19. However, no cases of serious illness were reported as a result of the dinner. At the 2024 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, pro-Palestinian protesters shouted “Shame on you!” at arriving attendees. Trump also declined to attend the dinner in 2025, the first year of his second presidency. Some members of his administration were also absent from the dinner and instead attended the launch party for Executive Branch, a new private club in Georgetown that is owned by Donald Trump Jr. and others with ties to the administration. He attended the dinner in 2026 before evacuating after gunshots were heard. After officers secured the Washington Hilton hotel building, the guests at the dinner departed the hotel. The first lady, Melania Trump, was also in attendance and evacuated promptly alongside her husband. An alleged shooter was arrested.

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WHCA’s annual dinner