Jeffrey Katzenberg is a man known for choosing his words very carefully most of the time, and tonight the WndrCo boss was pretty candid when it came to Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
26.04.2024 - 00:33 / deadline.com
As this year’s president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, NBC News senior White House Kelly O’Donnell will preside over one of the biggest evenings in D.C. — a mix of politicos, media types and celebrities airing live across C-SPAN and other networks.
But the issues that a WHCA president routinely deals with range from the weighty, like pushing for media access to the president and promoting the role of journalists in a free society; to the less earth-shaking but still important, like coping with plumbing issues in the tight confines of the press area of the West Wing.
O’Donnell on Thursday marked 30 years with NBC News, a tenure that has included covering four presidential administrations, seven election cycles and numerous major events, including embedding with troops in Iraq.
She took a break this week to chat with Deadline about the dinner, the challenging times for many in the media, and the “direct correlation” between shouted questions at the president and limited access.
DEADLINE: Do you have a preview at all of what you’re going to what you’re gonna say in your speech?
KELLY O’DONNELL: My hope is that we can use this night overall to remind people about why a free press is so vitally important, especially in a campaign year. I want the night to also reflect on members. I want them to see themselves in the evening. When we gather for these White House Correspondents’ dinners, there’s always a lot of fun, a lot of energy, all of those good things. I wanted to also feel like it’s about the story of the press corps and why our work matters.
I also think, in the contested, difficult times we are in, where the world is on edge and there are conflicts that we all covering, all of those real things
Jeffrey Katzenberg is a man known for choosing his words very carefully most of the time, and tonight the WndrCo boss was pretty candid when it came to Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
Michelle Yeoh is receiving a major honor!
“How many of you had ‘Mark Hamill will lead the press briefing’ on your bingo cards?” the Star Wars icon joked as he took the podium at the White House. “Yeah, me either.”
Phil Donahue and Michelle Yeoh are among the media and entertainment recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which Joe Biden will present at the White House later today.
President Joe Biden weighed in on the unrest on college campuses as a wave of pro-Palestinian demonstrations has led to mass arrests, vandalism and some violent incidents, saying in brief remarks that “order must prevail.”
Joe Biden welcomed journalists, artists, and cultural figures, including prominent Latinos who added their voices to the free press.Among the notable Latino figures in attendance were Boris Sanchez, Rosario Dawson, and Yamiche Alcindor.
Kim Kardashian made a notable appearance alongside Vice President Kamala Harris at the White House for a roundtable discussion. The discussion focused on President Joe Biden’s pardons.
Jax Taylor and Brittany Cartwright both hit the red carpet at the 2024 White House Correspondents Dinner held at The Washington Hilton on Saturday night (April 27) in Washington, DC.
The chants and shouts of pro-Palestinian demonstrators disrupted the entry to the Washington Hilton for this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, but once inside, attendees were greeted with what has become the usual scene: Celebrities on the red carpet, a crush for the security line and glitterati packed into a cavernous ballroom.
Colin Jost, the featured entertainer at this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, went all in on Donald Trump and his legal troubles, got in a few zingers about Joe Biden’s age and finished his gig by telling a long story of how the president is a “decent” man.
Some of Hollywood’s biggest stars descended on Washington, DC to attend the 2024 White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday night (April 27) at The Washington Hilton.
Joe Biden got in a few zingers at his rival Donald Trump, but he devoted a large part of his remarks to the serious threat to democracy.
Michaela Zee Colin Jost, the co-lead of “Saturday Night Live’s” long-running “Weekend Update,” is hosting the 2024 White House Correspondents Dinner Saturday night in Washington, D.C. The annual event, which typically consists of the night’s comedian roasting powerful political figures and various media outlets, is expected to feature an election-year roast from President Joe Biden.
Scarlett Johansson can’t keep her eyes off husband Colin Jost while on the red carpet at the 2024 White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday (April 27) in Washington, DC.
President Joe Biden is opening up about his mental state following the deaths of his wife Neilia and their infant daughter.
President Joe Biden wasn’t tossing out too many laugh lines Friday during his live appearance on Howard Stern’s SiriusXM show, but maybe he was saving them for his comedian-in-chief role at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday.
Steven Spielberg has made no secret of his support for Joe Biden’s reelection, and now the Oscar winner is rolling up his shirt sleeves for the team.
Kim Kardashian is back in the White House!
Joe Biden visited Howard Stern‘s SiriusXM show today, the latest interview that the president has given to a non-traditional media outlet.
TikTok.Yesterday (April 23), US Congress voted to pass the bill that will ban TikTok in the United States unless Chinese parent company ByteDance sells the platform’s US stakes. The vote came three days after it cleared the House of Representatives.Today (April 24), Biden signed the bill hours after Congress dealt the video-sharing platform’s Chinese ownership a historic rebuke following years of failed attempts to tackle the app’s alleged national security risks (per The Washington Post).Biden had previously indicated that he would approve of the legislation once it had hit his desk.