Even by the standards to which we’ve all, by now, become accustomed, President Donald Trump’s performance at Friday night’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner was bizarre. And the fact of it — from the style of his halting delivery to the substance of his vindictive message to a journalists’ group who’d handed him a mic — made clear that he’s now in something of a spiral. A public figure who, more than any politician or celebrity in our history, has placed the desire for approval at the center of his brand is being confronted by his dwindling popularity. (His approval rating was one of the topics Trump touched upon in a speech that felt less like what he calls “the weave” than like a ramble.) He doesn’t like that his style is falling out of favor, and he’s going to make sure, for the next two-plus years or perhaps even longer, that we know he doesn’t.
Trump’s speech Friday night served as a re-do of the planned address he was meant to give at the original 2026 WHCD in April, which was marred by a gunman firing shots inside the Washington Hilton. He had promised, then, to excoriate the press; on a rescheduled and more somber evening months later, he seemed unsure, at first, how to act. “Let’s have a little bit of fun,” he said. “What do we do here? Is this supposed to be fun, am I supposed to be serious, am I supposed to be a comedian?” But old reflexes kicked in: Just before this, Trump had complained about the evening’s awards, which had gone to various journalists whose work (naturally, given their profession covering the current administration) had been adversarial to his interests. “This has not been an easy evening, all those awards,” he said. “Do I have a say?” Later, he’d go on to criticize journalists including CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and the Wall Street Journal’s Josh Dawsey by name.
