President Trump on Sunday joined in on the criticism of comedian Michelle Wolf’s performance at this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) dinner, calling her “filthy” and slamming the event as an “embarrassment.”
“The White House Correspondents’ Dinner was a failure last year, but this year was an embarrassment to everyone associated with it,” Trump tweeted.
{mosads}“The filthy ‘comedian’ totally bombed (couldn’t even deliver her lines-much like the Seth Meyers weak performance). Put Dinner to rest, or start over!” he added, referencing Meyers’s 2011 headlining performance in which he made a number of jokes at Trump’s expense. That same event also featured former President Obama mocking Trump, who at the time was one of the leading promoters of the “birther” conspiracy theory, which sought to cast doubt that Obama was a naturally born American citizen. Some point to Obama’s monologue that night as the moment that led Trump to run for president.
Trump did not attend Saturday night’s gala. For the second consecutive year, he held a campaign rally outside the nation’s capital that coincided with the event.
In his absence, Wolf gave a 20-minute monologue that took aim at the president, Vice President Pence, Ivanka Trump, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the media and others.
Numerous journalists and conservative commentators expressed disapproval with Wolf’s remarks, saying she had gone too far, particularly in her jokes aimed at Sanders.
Some reporters went as far as to suggest the dinner cease to exist in its current form.
WHCA President Margaret Talev said in a statement Sunday night that Wolf’s monologue “was not in the spirit” of the organization’s mission of promoting journalism and a free press.
Celebrities and a number of other journalists have defended Wolf, arguing that she did what she was hired to do in roasting the current administration. Others pointed out that the president has made vulgar remarks and pushed conspiracy theories without apologizing.