President Donald Trump will not attend the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner later this month, snubbing the high-profile event amid tensions with the press.
Trump will skip the April 26 event, according to several outlets, as he did for all four of the dinners held during his first administration. His absence is the latest escalation in a feud between the Trump administration and the White House Correspondents’ Association, which hosts the annual dinner.
Trump won’t attend even after the WHCA pulled comedian Amber Ruffin from the speaking lineup for the televised event over concerns of recent anti-Trump comments. The WHCA said the decision was made “to ensure the focus is not on the politics of division but entirely on awarding our colleagues for their outstanding work and providing scholarship and mentorship to the next generation of journalists.”
Still, tensions between Trump officials and the WHCA have been nearing a boiling point for months, especially after the White House announced in February it would be taking over the press corps’ rotating assignments for journalists covering the president. That decision breaks decades of tradition of the WHCA handling the affairs of journalists in the press pool, prompting pushback from the association.
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