Here Were All the Big Moments on CNN From a Chaotic, Unprecedented WHCD

Curtis Houck
April 26th, 2026 4:09 AM

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Saturday’s 2026 White House Correspondents Dinner was expected to be an unprecedented affair with President Trump and members of his Cabinet entering political enemy territory on liberal, elite media’s biggest single annual day of self-adulating slop.

Trump later joked he had prepared “the most inappropriate speech ever made,” but he was unable to deliver it as a gunman tore through a security checkpoint just after 8:30 p.m. Eastern during dinner. In CNN’s case, they abruptly pulled out of a commercial break.

Below are some of the big moments from CNN’s coverage of what was already going to be a history-making evening, but came that for all the wrong reasons.

Before the shooting, CNN’s Brian Stelter argued to Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt that, while “you say he’s been very accessible,” the President “tries to demonize the press.”

Stelter also offered standard fare, bemoaning Trump “has gone on the warpath against news outlets,” “called journalists…nasty names,” and “defunded PBS and NPR.” He even speculated a long Trump speech would cause questions to be raised “about his fitness for office.”

But, as we’ll see, Stelter became a real, genuine source of information once the evening took a turn.

But back to life before the shooting, Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) sufferer S.E. Cupp dropped at 8:08 p.m. Eastern the hottest take of the night, which was made scalding hot when violence erupted (click the tweet to read the lunacy in full):

Fellow CNN liberal Van Jones wasn’t having any of this. Instead, he said the WHCD “is a wonderful evening in Washington, D.C., where people come together and put aside their partisan differences,” which “is awesome” and “I don’t care about what anybody says.”

Our friend and 2025 MRC Bulldog Award winner Scott Jennings was also jubilant and directly addressed Cupp by opining, “journalism has never had more access to the leader of the free world than they have right now.”

“[H]e may roast the press, and they spend 24 hours a day roasting him, and they need to have a little bit of thick skin and put on their big boy pants and take it…I think the press is thriving in the Trump era. The access we have and the information that we get to bring to the American people, because he allows it is a good thing, objectively a good thing,” he added.

Following more banter and then White House Correspondents Association President Weijia Jiang’s opening remarks, CNN went to break. Here was the movement they jolted out to share the disturbing turn:

Less than five minutes later, co-hosts John Berman and Laura Coates went to Stelter inside the Washington Hilton ballroom as he had taken out his phone and began streaming to describe what was happening:

CNN host Kaitlan Collins also called in (with someone else streaming her vantage point, alongside Secretary of Education Linda McMahon):

Stelter then returned to talk things through with CNN’s congressional Republican chaser Manu Raju:

The most bizarre moment of all this came next when The Lead and State of the Union host Jake Tapper not only took Stelter’s phone, but kept spinning around. Do with that as you may:

Back on-set and with word Trump and the WHCA had wanted to resume the event (before security put their foot down), Jones said “there is some strength that's trying to be shown here” in “[t]hat you don't stop this country and you don't stop the celebration of the First Amendment because you're a crazy person with a gun.”

On political violence, he said “this is the sort of stuff that has to stop” and “[t]his is the level of violence and crazy stuff on all sides of this country, is leading people to think that this is the right thing to do.”

Jennings agreed with his friend and went even further:

After Jiang’s first update to the room, CNN had a series of calls over the next hour-plus with The Situation Room co-host Wolf Blitzer recounting his harrowing experience of being steps away from the shooter and being tackled and shielded by a police officer:

CNN eventually came back to Cupp and, at 9:24 p.m. Eastern, she stepped on another proverbial rake by demanding viewers keep an open mind and that the target may have been journalists, not the President:

Jones delivered a respectful but forceful response to Cupp about the need to show resilience:

Jennings backed him up after Jiang announced the dinner’s postponement: “I think Van, you said it right earlier that the political element here is that we cannot allow people to believe they can show up with weapons and shut down anything that the President or the press or anything else we're doing that causes our it makes our country run on a daily basis. We cannot allow it.”

Cupp and fellow liberal Van Lathan invoked gun violence and that this shooting reinforces the fact that “this country is sick” and nothing is supposedly being done about it, with no one, again, supposedly willing to acknowledge it:

Reporting outside the Hilton, weekday morning CNN News Central co-host Sara Sidner shared upsetting video she took after the attack of Erika Kirk being escorted out in tears and saying she wanted to get out:

Moving into the 10:00 p.n. Eastern hour and before the President addressed the nation, Jennings reminded CNN’s liberal audience that many of those who protected the journalists and politicians assembled have been gone over 70 days without pay due to the partial government shutdown:

On a different but vital topic, Jones noted everyone there will experience the trauma differently:

He also gave Blitzer a shout-out:

Somehow, some way, Stelter made it across town to CNN’s D.C. bureau to join the panel and began sharing his recollections two hours post-gun shots:

Following the President’s press conference, those assembled rendered their final thoughts. Jones hailed Trump’s remarks and warned the public to steel itself for the possibility that a portion of the populace will lionize the suspect like many have with Luigi Mangione:

Jennings continued his theme of backing up his friend from across the political spectrum, stating Trump hit the “perfect tone” in showing unity with the press (despite the bombs both sides throw) and speed in delivering information to the public:

Finally, we’ll end this round-up and mishmash of moments across six hours of CNN coverage where we began with Stelter, who shared one of the first people to make sure he was okay after shots fired was someone Stelter has perhaps been the most viciously critical towards:

While the liberal, elite media will almost certainly go back to war against President Trump by Sunday morning and perhaps even cheerlead a third impeachment in the months or years to come, they were able to largely come together on one night when someone in either camp (the media or the President’s) could have lost their life.

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