ROGER KIMBALL ON TONIGHT’S ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT:

Donald and Melania Trump entered the hall at 8:16 to cheers and applause. “Hail to the Chief” was followed by presentation of the colors and the National Anthem. We had a brief introduction from Weijia Jiang, this year’s president of the White House Correspondents Association, followed by dinner.

Two questions hovered in the background. One, how would President Trump treat the press? And two, would he, as had many presidents in the past at this event, treat the audience to a little self-deprecating humor? “Donald Trump” and “self-deprecation” are not words you often hear together, but who knows? The President is also a master communicator who reads his audience well.

We never found out. At about 8:35, four loud noises were heard from the back of the room. They were shots. . . .

“The First Amendment,” “Free Speech,” “A Free Media” are different ways of enunciating what the dinner is supposed to be all about. Not much mention, if any, will be given to the clamp down on free speech under the Biden administration or the liberating revolution sparked by Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and his campaign to restore speech to the platform and hence to the wider media environment.

Donald Trump has probably given the media more access to his thoughts than any president in history. At least part of many of his Cabinet meetings are open to the media and he seldom boards or exits a plane without stopping to answer questions. If he thinks a question is stupid or ill-informed, he will say so. Fake news he treats as fake news. The media hates that, of course, but has anyone ever treated them more like adults?

Well, but they’re not. They’re middle school Mean Girls with a megaphone.