The Latest: Comic draws gasps at correspondents’ dinner

WASHINGTON – The Latest on the annual White House Correspondents Association dinner (all times local):

11:30 p.m.

If President Donald Trump isn’t comfortable being the target of jokes, comedian Michelle Wolf gave him and others plenty of reasons to squirm Saturday night.

Wolf cracked, “It’s 2018 and I’m a woman, so you cannot shut me up — unless you have Michael Cohen wire me $130,000.”

No, Trump’s personal attorney wasn’t there. And, for the second year, Trump himself skipped the annual dinner of the White House Correspondents’ Association, preferring to criticize journalists and others during a campaign-style rally near Detroit.

Wolf was the after-dinner entertainment for the White House press corps and their guests, and she was surprisingly vulgar for the venue. After one crass joke drew groans in the Washington Hilton ballroom, she said, “Yeah, shoulda done more research before you got me to do this.”

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11:30 a.m.

White House aides, reporters and other famous-for-Washington types are set to gather without President Donald Trump to toast press freedom.

It’ll be the second White House Correspondents’ Association dinner without Trump. He posted on Facebook this week that he’ll be at a Saturday night rally in Michigan with his “favourite deplorables” — a term Hillary Clinton used in 2016 to describe some Trump supporters.

Trump’s aides skipped last year’s dinner, too. But this year, many are expected to attend.

Comedian Michelle Wolf is on tap to deliver what’s traditionally been a roast of the administration and the press.

The dinner promotes press freedom and responsibility. Trump regularly talks to reporters but says many members of the mainstream media are dishonest.