President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday that he's looking forward to a rally planned in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and that he's expecting a "big crowd, big energy."
Trump's rally will kick off at about the same time as the annual White House Correspondents' Association dinner, which the president decided to skip this year while continuing his arguments that the press does not treat him fairly.
Presidents attending the dinner are often targeted with jokes, but without Trump, the event will focus this year less on the celebrities who are usually invited to the dinner as guests of media outlets and more on the First Amendment and the role of the press in a democracy.
Trump is the first president to skip the annual event since President Ronald Reagan opted to stay away. However, Reagan stayed away not because of having problems with the press, but because he was recovering after being shot in 1981 during an assassination attempt, reports NPR.
Reagan called in from Camp David to the event, however, and offered a joke about the shooting, telling journalists that "when somebody tells you to get in a car quick, do it."
Former President Jimmy Carter skipped the correspondents' dinner altogether in 1980 and 1978, and before him, former President Richard Nixon skipped it twice, in 1974 and 1972, reports NPR.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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