The WCHD Do-Over Dilemma
Over the weekend, after the White House Correspondents’ Dinner was upended by a gunman who attempted to storm the ballroom, Donald Trump immediately made his wishes known. The president, defiant in the wake of the attempted attack, initially tried to carry on with the event as planned that evening, but in the face of security concerns later declared that he wanted a dinner do-over held “within 30 days.”
That 30-day deadline represented an extraordinary ask of the White House Correspondents’ Association, which puts on the annual affair, given the considerable hurdles that would have to be cleared to pull off a second event. In the aftermath of the shooting, a number of industry insiders cast doubt on whether a second event would ever happen at all. Notably, WHCA president Weijia Jiang never outright committed to holding one, and the organization has yet to disclose its plans.
But Status has learned that the WHCA has been hard at work this week, holding private meetings to hash out its options. And according to people familiar with the internal deliberations…
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