Forty years ago, as a White House reporter for Knight-Ridder Newspapers (now McClatchy), I waged a small battle on behalf of democracy.
I prodded the White House Correspondents Association to hold annual elections for officers, a requirement under the organization’s bylaws that had been ignored for years. Until my protest, outgoing officers merely handed their posts to friends, who would negotiate coverage policies with the White House that often were disadvantageous to reporters like me.
Today, it is the association that must wage a heroic battle for democratic principles, one that is far more important: preserving a free press that President Trump is trampling with his reckless behavior and contempt for honest journalism.
For more than a century, the White House Correspondents Association has thrown an annual spring dinner with the stated purpose of celebrating the First Amendment. By tradition, the president and top officials of the administration are invited because they, too, believe in a free press.
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The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. Sign up for the Opinion newsletter SubscribeAt one point during the black-tie event, the assemblage of nearly 3,000 journalists, government officials, business executives and celebrities stand to toast the First Amendment, a recognition that an adversarial relationship when it comes to coverage of an administration can still thrive on mutual respect for one another’s roles in keeping a free society informed.
Now is the time to stop breaking bread with the Trump administration, starting with tomorrow's White House Correspondents Association dinner.
Trump and his administration's acolytes have made clear they have no respect for the First Amendment, traditional news media, fair reporting or the truth these organizations reveal to the American public.
Trump, the first president to skip the dinner during his first term, previously labeled mainstream media “the enemy of the people,” and in February started barring the Associated Press from attending some White House events, because its influential style book would not officially rename the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America,” as Trump insists it be called.
The Associated Press went to court, and a federal judge ruled that the White House had violated the organization’s First Amendment rights and ordered that its right to cover Trump be reinstated. Of course, the White House is appealing the decision.
That’s not all. The White House commandeered away from the White House Correspondents Association the “pool” rotation system. The pool has long been used for determining which small group of reporters, representative of various media, get to cover presidential events in person. Pool reporters then share the details with their colleagues.
Instead, the White House, borrowing a tactic used by authoritarian leaders in other countries, said it would decide who joins the pool, with the intention of giving “friendly” reporters preference.
In another chilling move against free speech, the administration has detained and is deporting foreign nationals who are in the U.S. legally because it doesn’t like their views in support of Palestinians in Gaza or other causes that displease the Trump crowd.
In view of such behavior, the White House Correspondents Association would mock the very reason it was established, were it to hold the dinner this spring with Trump enablers in attendance — even if Trump himself boycotts the event again.
The association was created in 1914 in response to President Woodrow Wilson’s plan to do away with press conferences because he was unhappy with coverage by some newspapers. Standing up for fair-minded reporters doing their job on behalf of the American people is what the White House Correspondents Association should be about, not sitting down to dine with people who want to destroy a free press.
So, here’s a better idea for the dinner: Don’t cancel it, as some reporters have suggested. Instead, re-dedicate it to a vibrant First Amendment in America from start to end.
Disinvite all the Trumpers and instead invite as special guests those who have fought to protect press freedom around the world. Include leaders of the American Civil Liberties Union and the Reporters’ Committee for Freedom of the Press, courageous reporters from other countries who have risked their lives to inform their citizens, those representing journalism prizes that shine a light on the great reporting our profession produces every year and journalism professors who inspire students to join our craft.
Use the proceeds to continue the scholarships for promising students who are committed to pursuing honest and fair journalism.
Canceling the evening’s comic entertainer, Amber Ruffin, under pressure from the White House because she has lampooned Trump in the past, is shameful. It is only too revealing of the organization’s lack of a backbone to stand up to a bully.
It’s no doubt asking too much for the White House Correspondents Association to show some gumption and organize a boycott of White House briefings, so long as Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stands up at the podium and tosses out lies and anti-press venom.
At the least, the association can hold a dinner with like-minded supporters of a free press to honor that unique privilege and to pledge to defend it. The American public and the future of our nation deserve no less.
Owen Ullmann, a frequent attendee at the White House Correspondents Association’s annual dinners, is executive editor of The International Economy magazine. He is the author of "Empathy Economics" (2022), a biography of former Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
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