New Yorker, Vanity Fair nix White House Correspondents Dinner events: Report

Two prominent left-leaning society magazines have opted not to throw their traditional White House Correspondents Association dinner parties this year, Variety magazine reported Friday.

Vanity Fair typically throws an after-party while the New Yorker plies partiers with a cocktail party thrown the night before the dinner, Variety magazine reported Friday, but both have opted not to host those soirees this year. 

In recent years the WHCA’s annual dinner and pre- and post-dinner hospitality events have been occasions for news industry executives, journalists, politicians and Hollywood celebrities to rub shoulders.

During the actual dinner, the president himself gives remarks, usually a joke monologue laden with self-deprecatory humor, before the emcee roasts both the president and the media, albeit usually with a relatively light touch. 

In 2011, the formula was thrown off a bit when it was Donald Trump who found himself the target of an extended barrage of jokes by then-President Obama regarding the New York Republican’s questioning of the validity of Mr. Obama’s birth certificate. Dinner emcee comedian Seth Meyers piled on in his monologue afterward.

While it remains to be seen if other media outlets cancel or pare back their hospitality events pegged to the correspondents’ dinner, WHCA President Jeff Mason insisted in a recent letter that the show itself will go on. “[T]his year, as we do every year, we will celebrate the First Amendment and the role an independent press plays in a healthy republic,” Mr. Mason said, Variety reported.

In addition to serving as a social function, the WHCA also uses its annual dinner as an occasion to contribute financially to the next generation of journalists.

“The WHCA sponsors some $100,000 in scholarships that are awarded at our annual dinner every year,” according to the association’s website. “In 2016, to go beyond just awarding funds, the board started a mentorship program that paired up students with members of the association for career advice and counsel. The program was a big success.”