Eat and Get Out: Two Traditional Press Dinners Adopt Hostile Positions Against Trump

As expected, the relationship between the Trump White House and the media resumed where it ended in the first term in outright warfare. The mutual disdain has become open contempt as was evident this week when, reportedly for the first time in its 140-year history, the Gridiron Club journalism dinner omitted the toast to the U.S. president. This follows the selection of a comedian for the White House Correspondent’s Dinner who promptly declared that no one wants Trump to come because no one wants to be in the same room with him. The media is doubling down on its identity as part of “the resistance.” In the meantime, the public is rushing to new and alternative media for their information.

I have criticized President Trump over some of his statements and actions toward the media over the years, including the recent exclusion of the Associated Press over a disagreement with its standards guide. However, the media has also been wrong in its unrelenting attacks and hostile stance toward the Trump Administration.

The press moved into hyperdrive after the inauguration. This was an impressive pivot after four years of the press running interference for the Biden Administration and echoing the narratives put out by the Democrats. The press had little real interest in the millions of dollars acquired by the Bidens through alleged influence peddling or the obvious deterioration of the President mentally and physically. Many reporters were content to cover Biden’s runs for ice cream rather than delve into controversies like the massive censorship system coordinated and funded through the Administration.

Ironically, the Biden team still kept an enabling media at bay. It could not risk even brief, unscripted moments, and Biden set modern records for his unavailability to media in press conferences and interviews. They confined his appearances to softball interviews with CNN or MSNBC or the hosts of far-left influencers.

The press’s hostility has only grown despite Trump’s unprecedented access to reporters. He has allowed the greatest level of access to the media in decades, giving long interviews and press conferences.

Indeed, everyone in D.C. seems exhausted after only 50 days. Trump’s election was like being gifted a golden retriever puppy by a friend. After two days, you are left staring at him at 3 in the morning and screaming “why won’t you sleep?”

One would think that this change in access would at least produce some interest in covering the White House with neutrality and objectivity.  However, both neutrality and objectivity were discarded years ago by many in journalism schools.

The gratuitous insults on both sides do not bode well for the future relations. However, there is a difference in yielding to such impulses. Trump is a politician. The press is an institution. Regardless of how the subject of coverage may treat the media, there remains a professional and ethical obligation to report on stories fairly and objectively.

Moreover, there are legitimate gripes against the media for its fostering false conspiracy theories and over-wrought rhetoric against Trump. Again, that does not mean that Trump is right to call the media the enemy of the people or recently to suggest that coverage should be treated as a crime. Trump only undermines his own case with such extreme positions. Yet, the media has far more to lose in engaging in tit-for-tat insults.

At two dinners used historically to build bridges with presidents, the media decided to use the events as a way of slapping back at Trump like hurt school children.

Eugene Daniels, the president of WHCA’s board and a Politico correspondent, selected an anti-Trump comedian in a virtual withdrawal of the invitation for the president to attend. Why should he appear at a dinner that has been weaponized by the WHCA?

Notably, the prior year, the dinner (which I attended) featured Colin Jost. The comedian (before the election) gave a tearful comparison of Biden to his late Irish fire-fighting grandfather. It was nothing short of a public campaign endorsement.

Now, one year later, Daniels and the WHCA brought in a vehemently anti-Trump comedian who promptly said that Trump was not welcome.

Then the media pulled the stunt with the toast at the Gridiron dinner.

Ironically, in a letter to the White House, Daniels used his position to defend Associated Press and other outlets in the name of the free press. Yet, he is viewed as the embodiment of the advocacy journalism that has alienated not just Trump but many citizens.

The press remains at record lows in trust with the public. This is hardly going to help. It is a virtual invitation for the public, like Trump, to go elsewhere. The media is increasingly writing for each other rather than an increasingly disengaged public.

In the end, these juvenile antics will only further erode trust in the media and push many readers and viewers to new media. These media figures have bulldozed any high ground in the conflicts with the White House. The Daniels letter is again an example of what is lost when you engage in highly political conduct and then seek to speak in favor of the traditions of a neutral and objective independent press.

After showing the traditional toast in past years to sitting presidents at the Gridiron dinner, Judy Woodruff, president of the Gridiron Club, declared that this year they would only offer “a toast to the First Amendment.” Woodruff has been repeatedly challenged for alleged anti-Trump sentiments and even spreading false claims against Trump.

In the end, many may have gotten what they wanted — the effective disinviting of the president and his staff from these traditional dinners. Even Trump Press Sec. Karoline Leavitt now says that she will not attend the White House Correspondent’s Association dinner.

Problem solved. The dinners can become just new echo chambers maintained by the media and largely ignored by the public.