Actual malice

By forging ahead with its annual black-tie dinner, with Donald and Melania Trump as guests of honor, the White House Correspondents Association has unintentionally met the standard for the libel law Trump and his sycophants wish to trash: showing a reckless disregard for the truth.

The dinner, not-so-affectionately known as “Nerd Prom,” brings together reporters and the people they cover for what was once a light-hearted effort to mix and mingle and raise scholarship funds.

At least until Donald Trump fumed while Barack Obama roasted the then-reality television star over his leading the “fake news” controversy of whether the Hawaii-born president was an American citizen:

Donald Trump is here tonight! Now, I know that he’s taken some flak lately, but no one is happier, no one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than the Donald. And that’s because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter — like, did we fake the moon landing? What really happened in Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?

That moment is often cited as the one where Trump decided to run for president himself — on a platform of grievances against, among other things, the “enemy of the people” known as the media.

And for all of the twists and turns of the scrambled Trump platform, one constant has been looking for ways to weaken and demean journalists while simultaneously seeking their attention.

That contradiction has never been clearer than during Trump 2.0, where he in effect anointed press secretary Karolyin’ Leavitt as president of the White House Correspondents Association — giving her the power the group once held to determine who attended briefings and flew on Air Force One — while happily spinning reporters who had his personal cell phone number with short “exclusives.”

And how did the WCHA respond? By inviting the man who had previously boycotted the dinners to be this year’s guest of honor!

Oh, and creating a freedom of the press pocket square and pin.

But fear not, the intrepid journalists also decided to use the dinner to publicly honor their colleagues who broke a story about Trump’s “bawdy” participation in a 50th birthday celebration book for Jeffrey Epstein.

A story that included producing a letter Trump denied he wrote. Which in turn prompted a $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal, a case just tossed by a federal judge because it failed to meet the high bar that the story was published with “absolute malice,” defined by the Supreme Court as a “reckless disregard for the truth.”

The abject surrender by the WCHA has not gone unnoticed — whether by a former White House bureau chief for the Associated Press, which was exiled by Leavitt for refusing to rename the Gulf of Mexico — to more than 250 former broadcast journalists including presidential pains-in-the-butt Dan Rather and Sam Donaldson, who urged the organizers “to forcefully demonstrate opposition to President Trump’s efforts to trample freedom of the press.”

“This represents the most systematic and comprehensive assault on freedom of the press by a sitting American president…

“These are not normal times and this cannot be business as usual with the press standing up to applaud the man who attacks them on a daily basis.”

But the current WCHA leadership has apparently missed the reality that the dismissed WSJ lawsuit was simply one of many against outlets like The Washington Post, New York Times, Meta, the Des Moines Register, the BBC, ABC and CBS News.

Ah yes, CBS News. The organization that plans a special Thursday night dinner “honoring” Trump and its own news team, an event hosted by Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison, who is lobbying for federal approval of his proposed purchase of Warner Brothers Discovery — including CNN, Trump’s least favorite television news outlet.

And which has invited Pete “SignalGate” Hegseth and Stephen Miller to the Saturday night event.

A news organization which, pre-Ellison, hung national security journalist Catherine Herridge out to dry after a federal court ordered her to reveal sources for her reporting on a scientist’s alleged ties to the Chinese military while an online college he founded received federal funds.

The FBI ended its investigation without bringing charges, a year before Herridge and her colleagues published and aired their reporting. For Fox News — which has stuck by her.

“Fox News Media remains committed to protecting the rights of a free press and freedom of speech…”

All this is taking place as right-wing media — most noticeably former Fox Newsers Megyn Kelly and Tucker Carlson have publicly excoriated Trump for the handling of his war of choice with Iran. And while former Forever Trumpers like Marjorie Taylor Greene and InfoWars conspiracist Alex Jones have called Trump’s mental status into question.

Speaking with John Heilmann on a recent “Impolitic” podcast, Never Trumper and current Democratic candidate for Congress George Conway offered a simple reason why the right is starting to break with Trump.

“They lost control of him.”

The Fox Propaganda Channel continues to stand by Trump — Sean Hannity recently chose Trump over the leader of his Catholic faith. But as legal discovery in the Dominion Voting Systems lawsuit showed, even Fox executives knew Trump lost the 2020 election.

Yet somehow legacy media, or at least those stationed in the White House press room, continue to ignore the realities surrounding the 47th President, even as the one unshakeable benchmark of political journalism — polling — shows Trump losing altitude among voters rapidly.

It’s hard to find a better example of the continued timidity than by comparing coverage of the allegations of sexual assault against former California congressman Eric Swalwell with the failure to constantly recall Trump’s civil liability for sexually assaulting E. Jean Carroll. Or the fact he is a convicted felon.

It’s called background and context.

Those former broadcast journalists aren’t asking for much — just a “forceful defense of freedom of the press and condemnation of those who threaten that freedom.” right there in front of Trump.

Whether the WHCA listens is another question.

Nor are the former journos asking for the dinner to be cancelled — even though there are better ways to raise scholarship funds than self-abasement.

Maybe, just maybe, Kash Patel has given them a way out. The FBI Director just filed a $250 million suit against The Atlantic for a story detailing “excessive drinking” and “unexplained absences.” You know, against the news organization clumsily invited onto a Signal chat as the U.S. launched a military strike against the Houthis.

Patel — who somehow found the time to party with U.S. hockey gold medal Olympians — promises a vigorous prosecution.

I for one can’t wait to see the video deposition the Atlantic’s attorneys will conduct if the case doesn’t get thrown out for failing to show a reckless disregard of the truth.

If not, the WCHA should invite the Cowardly Lion to its next shindig.