White House Correspondents’ Association Prepping for Annual Dinner Return in 2022
WASHINGTON — The White House Correspondents’ Association is laying the groundwork for the return of its annual dinner in 2022, after COVID-19 and related public gathering restrictions forced the cancellation of the past two events.
The upcoming WHCA dinner will be held at the Washington Hilton on April 30, 2022.
The WHCA is requiring that all guests and dinner staff be vaccinated, according to a memo sent to members by Association President Steve Portnoy on Friday.
While the event is most widely known as a glitzy gathering of public officials, assorted Hollywood stars and other celebrities and D.C. insiders, it’s actual purpose is to raise money for scholarships.
The cost of tickets, which will go on sale in the spring, is $350 per seat and $3,500 per table.
But the association reminded the media companies that do most of the buying that “an important priority for us is ensuring that the hard-working White House journalists who constitute our membership are able to attend our dinner.
“So while we welcome organizations to bring special guests, we also urge bureau chiefs to invite as many WHCA members in their employ as possible,” it said.
Until the Trump administration, it was tradition for the current president of the United States to attend. The last one to do so was President Barack Obama.
Though there’s no official word yet whether President Joe Biden will attend, he and First Lady Jill Biden are attending this weekend’s Kennedy Center honors, a sign that despite the omicron variant, normalcy continues to return to the D.C. region.
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