One of the swampy spring media-insider events every year is the Gridiron Club dinner, and Team Trump decided this year that it didn't feel like playing nice. It sounds like they weren't nice. Puck’s Dylan Byers reported those in attendance did not toast the president for the first time in the dinner’s history. Instead, the journalists toasted the First Amendment.
In the same way that White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced to Sean Spicer this week that she's not attending the White House Correspondents Dinner, they're go to act a different way in the second term. They're still granting far more access to Team Biden, but they don't need to pander to a hostile press at Saturday night dinners.
PBS correspondent (and retired News Hour anchor) Judy Woodruff, the president of the Gridiron Club who emceed the dinner, told Politico in a statement:
“At most of the Gridiron Club’s Spring Dinners, the President of the United States has spoken. In some years, the Vice President has filled in, and on occasion a high-level Administration figure. I invited the President, the Vice President, the National Security Adviser, and the Interior Secretary — all declined. I was told the Secretary of State would not be available.
To close the evening — when the sitting President usually speaks — we showed video and audio excerpts of the past four Republican presidents, starting with President Trump in 2018. These demonstrated the good humor and fellowship this dinner is all about.”
The New York Times summarized the "good humor and fellowship" with this headline: "At Gridiron Dinner, Jokes About Trump, Musk and Russia Abound." The first joke quoted by reporter Shawn McCreesh came from Gov. Wes Moore (D-Md.):
“If I actually wanted to be president, I wouldn’t do any of this,” he said. “Instead, I would take my case directly to the people who are in charge of our democracy. The Kremlin.”
Even after all these years, jokes about Mr. Trump and Russia still play with the official Washington crowd. Those in the Hyatt basement, which was packed with reporters, editors, television anchors and ambassadors, laughed along.
"Fellowship" spreader Woodruff "opened up the room with jokes about Mr. Musk’s fathering so many children and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s drinking." Woodruff also wisecracked about "Big Balls," a young Musk DOGE worker. She mocked the Democrats as disorganized. Another act featured men playing Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer being "lost in the woods."
Democrat reporters feel free to mock their fellow Democrats as disorganized, and then later, they'll them how to organize it, with media assistance.
One song-and-dance number involved a man dressed as Elon Musk in his "Tech Support" T-shirt waving a chainsaw around, singing about his turn toward from left to "far right," ha ha: ‘I’ll turn the G.O.P. into the AFD,’ he sang, referring to the German political party in favor of an immigration crackdown.
Then "another act had a mock Usha Vance singing about being a phony populist.” The media barely mention Usha Vance, but they still free to make fun of her.
The Times story ended this way:
Margaret Brennan of CBS shouted out members of the diplomatic corps from Britain, France, Australia and the European Union. “You know,” she said, “all of America’s enemies.”
Then she introduced the Ukrainian ambassador — there was no joke told — and the many journalists in the room stood up to clap.
