The Problem with the White House Correspondents' Dinner

By Jack Goldfinger

As a yearly function that hosts the United States President, the White House press corps, and other high profile names in Washington, The White House Correspondents’ Dinner (WHCD) blurs a few ethical lines—including the ones between media and government, politics and leisure, and journalism and entertainment. Having evolved from a standard inauguration for new officers of the White House Correspondents’ Association when it was first introduced in 1921, the dinner has since expanded in size and status.

It is now attended by several of the most powerful government officials in the country, along with the members of many mainstream media outlets, and is perhaps best known for its tradition of a comedian’s roast of the executive branch. Although the comedy section of the evening has indeed produced some memorable instances of rare government accountability, the dinner itself reveals a cozy relationship between reporters and public officials, and its consequent threat to democracy that is often overlooked.

While the WHCD has long been considered an occasion for figures in the government and the press to laugh, dine, and celebrate together, those who have studied the principles of journalism will see this as an ethical hazard in the profession. Furthermore, it is indicative of an issue that extends far beyond this annual event, and is pervasive in political journalism year-round. As objectivity is a key tenet in the media, personal relationships between reporters and the people involved in a news story can risk a purely fact-based perspective.

This is especially dangerous when a story involves someone who regularly offers insider information to an author, as sources are an important currency in political journalism. In the same way that journalists crave new information, politicians strive for the positive public opinion that favorable reporting can grant them, and as a result, the relationship between a reporter and a political source is inherently transactional. If a journalist is relying on a certain person to inform their investigations, then consciously or not, they are likely to report on that person favorably in a subsequent news story that involves them. Writing for the British Columbian online journal The Tyee, Paul Willcocks warns in a piece entitled “Journalists: Never Befriend a Source” that:

“Business people and politicians are focused and good at what they do. If they leak information, it is strategic, designed to advance their interests or harm an opponent. And who is really benefiting from the relationship–the reporter who gets the information, or the source who takes advantage of friendship to advance his or her interests?”

This effect is also not exclusive to reports that include the sources themselves, as these insider figures can also use their status as leverage to insert their personal agendas into various news stories. Since many of these sources are government officials, this is one reason why the U.S. media typically reports on the government favorably in times of political conflict.

For example, the media is often considered a primary supporter of the U.S. involvement in Iraq, as a Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting study found that 71% of on-air sources were pro-Iraq war and only 3% were antiwar. When journalists are beholden to the government for their source material, they are expected to reflect the interests of those in power, and not the American people who they are intended to serve. Events like the WHCD which put the two groups in close proximity to each other only welcome this consequence.

Any type of personal relationship between a politician and a reporter, whether it is adversarial or friendly, can tread on an unhealthy bias. The previous two U.S. presidents, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, had opposite relationships with the media that both had a detrimental effect on the coverage of their administrations.

Obama was largely beloved by American journalists, and his WHCD appearances often received widespread praise and attention. A New York Times opinion piece from the end of his presidency entitled “A Farewell to the Comedian in Chief”, referring to an affectionate nickname given to Obama for his sense of humor, lamented his departure from office: “I miss him already. Miss his steady rationality, his I-got-this mien, the eight years without a hint of personal scandal. And not to be overlooked, I miss the wit of Barack Obama. No president has had a better comic sensibility.”

It is apparent from this piece and others like it that journalists were relatively uncritical of Obama during his leadership, and treated him affectionately as a friend or loved one. Even if he did avoid any personal scandals during his presidency, as the piece suggests, there was still plenty to criticize him for; this is, after all, the intended role for journalists to maintain in political reporting.

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, however, a poll from the Center for Media and Public Affairs in 2009 found that 73 percent of evaluative comments in the New York Times in Obama’s first 50 days in office were positive, even though 56% of Americans said they lacked confidence in his economic policies and 52% opposed his bailout of General Motors during the 2008 financial crisis. The article suggests that “rather than covering date nights and personality, the media should further investigate these issues so they can better inform the public.”

Trump, on the other hand, never attended the WHCD and maintained hostile relationships with reporters from the start of his campaign to the end of his presidency. His attitude towards the press was reflected in their coverage of him, as a Pew Research study found that...

Some 62% of reporting on Trump in his first 60 days was negative, compared to just 20% for Obama, and even 28% for George W. Bush, who held a notoriously low approval rating from the public but was more willing to cooperate with the media. Trump certainly made more political decisions worthy of criticism than his predecessor, but in the same vein as Obama’s presidency, coverage was overwhelmingly devoted to his character. The same report found that 69% of coverage was focused on Trump’s leadership and character, while only 31% dealt with policy and agenda.

Additionally, certain policies that both Trump and Obama were responsible for were criticized more heavily during Trump’s presidency. A Washington Times article that reported on Trump’s employment of tear gas at the US-Mexico border pointed out that “the same tear-gas agent that the Trump administration is taking heat for deploying against a border mob this weekend is actually used fairly frequently — including more than once a month during the later years of President Barack Obama’s administration.” It is not that Trump deserved to be treated more fairly by the media, since it was certainly their job to oppose his elitism and bigotry, but the problem is that they seemed most fueled by his estranged relationship with the press than by his impact on the American people. It is told from these stories and numbers that a public figure’s attitude and friendships with the media is highly influential on the way that they are reported on. The public audience that journalists are intended to report to, however, care little about insider relationships: Obama, Trump, and other leaders should receive equal scrutiny from the media over their political decisions, whether or not they are friendly to those who report on them.

The person who is most impacted by the WHCD and the relationship that it supports between the press and government is certainly not any public leader, but instead the average American who puts their trust in the news media. It is telling that although journalism was once considered a working class profession, the media’s impression of the news is now shaped largely by relationships with valuable inside sources and powerful government leaders. Reporters now spend their time in the circles of Washington politicians and businessmen rather than with citizens of Washington or any other town in the country. The modern Correspondents’ Dinner has effectively grouped them in with the elite class, and as Batya Ungar-Sargon explains in a piece for The Free Press called “How Journalism Abandoned the Working Class”, “journalism has become a profession of astonishing privilege over the past century, metamorphosing from a blue-collar trade into one of the occupations with the most highly educated workforces in the United States.”

To support this claim, a 2022 report from the National Council for the Training of Journalism found that 80% of journalists now come from upper class backgrounds, a number that has been rising for decades.

In an article on “The Relationship between Journalists and Politicians” for Media Helping Media, David Brewer asserts that:

“The role of politicians is supposed to be to represent those who elected them, and to ensure that the concerns of that electorate are listened to, considered, and, where appropriate, acted upon. In such a political system, the journalist should act on behalf of the audience to ensure that politicians do their job.”

The ultimate dilemma here is that the media no longer acts on behalf of the audience, because they are now more synonymous with the class that they are supposed to hold accountable. So what should be done about the current state of journalism in the United States to reinstate the media as a voice for the people? And what should the fate of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner be?

Media Vision

Journalists should reaffirm the need for a separation between media and government, and rebuild a closer bond with ordinary citizens. According to a Gallup poll, only 32% of Americans feel that they trust the media, which is an all time low. This distrust is frequently associated with the popular belief that the mainstream media serves the elite class more than the average American, and a valid one when looking at the social settings which journalists frequently share with politicians and businessmen. In order for people to believe once again that news outlets are speaking for them, journalists must prove that they know with whom their loyalty lies. News stories should appear to come from the perspective of the American citizen, with the media's implications and concerns about political issues being tied to the working-class.
However, it is not enough to simply have journalists acknowledge their intended role in society, as they should also demonstrate publicly that they are not interested in pursuing close relationships with those in power. This means the end of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner as it is currently operated. The White House Correspondents’ Association should remain as a form of consolidation for journalists covering Washington politics, but it cannot be working in such close collaboration with the people and institutions that it is intended to keep in check. The President of the United States should not be welcomed into a community that is professionally at odds with them. It is important to draw a hard line between media and government in any situation where their communication does not concern the news, because any other interaction risks personal and emotional connections that will likely affect a reporter’s level of objectivity.
Public figures should not be reported on based on their friendliness with the media or their personal character. As it is the goal of journalists to consider the American people, they should ultimately prioritize the impact that people in power will have on citizens. Although it can be easy to evaluate someone you know based on their personality, reporters must look beyond this to consider a person's greater public impact.
Journalists should not consider sources as invaluable figures. While it is acceptable to reach out to insiders when covering a certain story, indispensable relationships with these people should not form. As a rule of thumb, a journalist should never rely on the information of a certain person to the point where they have to consider how a news story that they write will be received by that person.
Finally, in their process of distancing from circles of power, the media should become more acquainted with the working class once again. Journalistic relationships with the rich and powerful should be replaced with relationships with ordinary Americans, whose experiences can help to shape a news story. People with working class backgrounds should also be welcomed onto news teams to write their own original perspectives. As this community becomes more ingrained in reporting, trust in the media is certain to rebound.