The last time a president and a comedian shared the stage at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner was six long years ago, when Larry Wilmore ended his presentation with a deeply personal farewell to Barack Obama. Much has changed in both politics and comedy since then.
Now, after a couple of years in which Donald Trump refused to attend and was criticized in absentia by, above all, comedian Michelle Wolf, two more years canceled due to the pandemic, and one in between that everyone involved would rather forget. Washington DC’s “nerd prom” made a tentative return Saturday night amid another wave of COVID that has already hit Vice President Kamala Harris.
But there was nothing tentative about host Trevor Noah’s set.
With Pete Davidson and Kim Kardashian among the famous faces in the room, the daily program The host opened his remarks by saying that it was his “great honor to speak at the nation’s most distinguished superspreading event.”
“I expect this from Sean Hannity, but the rest of you, what are you doing?” Noah asked. “You have spent the last two years telling everyone the importance of wearing masks and avoiding large gatherings indoors. Then the minute someone offers you a free dinner, you become Joe Rogan.” He then pointed out that we should have known something was wrong when Dr. Fauci “thought it was too dangerous” to attend the event while “Pete Davidson thinks it’s fine.”
No one got away unscathed during Noah’s no-holds-barred game, from Democrats like Kyrsten Sinema (“openly bisexual but restricted Republican”) and Republicans like Ron DeSantis (“He won’t even tell people if he got the booster. Or as they say in Florida, ‘Do not ask Do not Tell'”).
There were also plenty of jokes at the expense of embattled media figures like Chris Cuomo and Jeffrey Toobin, who he said could still win the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album after “coming out” in front of their peers.
“This is an exclusive event,” he added. “In fact, as I walked in, I heard Meghan McCain say to the doorman, ‘Do you know who my father was?’ They said, you have a ticket, you can come in, but she insisted on telling them who her father was anyway.”
For meet the press host Chuck Todd, Noah asked, “How are you? I would ask you for a follow up, but I know you don’t know what they are.” As the crowd groaned, he added: “Don’t boo him, he’s trying!”
The host then compared Fox News to Waffle House, explaining, “It’s relatively normal in the afternoon, but as soon as the sun goes down, there’s a drunk lady named Jeanine who threatens to fight every Mexican who walks in.” He called the network’s prime-time programming so “impactful” that its “vaccine segments took its viewers … to the ICU.”
Seeing Fox’s Laura Ingraham in the crowd, Noah said, “Wow, what can you say about her that the Anti-Defamation League hasn’t already said?”
Before Noah took the stage, President Biden got some early help from James Corden for a mildly humorous pre-recorded video in which the outgoing late show The host briefly replaced Jen Psaki as White House press secretary, with a cameo appearance by the Fox News reporter whom the president once called a “stupid son of a bitch.”
When it was his turn to tell some jokes of his own, Biden began by poking fun at his own dismal approval ratings, saying it’s no wonder it’s been six years since a president spoke at dinner since the country suffered from a “horrible plague.” followed by two years of COVID.” He drew some groans as he added, “Imagine if my predecessor came to this dinner this year, that would have been a real coup.”
“I know there are questions about whether we should meet here tonight because of COVID,” Biden added later. “Well, we are here to show the country that we are overcoming this pandemic. In addition, everyone had to prove that they were fully vaccinated and boosted. So if you’re at home watching this and wondering how to do it, reach out to your favorite Fox News reporter. They are all here, vaccinated and reinforced, all of them”.
For good measure, the camera cut to Fox’s Peter Doocy, who barely cracked a smile.
At the end of his speech, which lasted more than 25 minutes, Trevor Noah used his time in the spotlight to challenge the journalists in the room to use their uniquely American freedom for good.
“In America, you have the right to seek the truth and tell the truth, even if it makes people in power uncomfortable,” Noah said. “Even if it makes viewers or readers uncomfortable. Do you understand how amazing that is? I was here tonight and I made fun of the President of the United States and I’m going to be fine.”
Turning to Biden, he asked, “I’m going to be fine, right?”
But before he left, Noah took one more dig at the president. “Be careful leaving tonight,” he told the crowd. “We all know that this administration does not handle evacuations well.”
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Reference-www.thedailybeast.com