President Donald Trump offered some words of praise to the White House press corps covering his second administration during a Cabinet meeting on Friday.
“I want to thank a lot of the media people because many of you have been very, very fair,” Trump said while speaking at Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland. “That’s one of the reasons you’re here, frankly. But you’ve been very fair.”
The White House press corps is not normally allowed at Camp David unless expressly invited to cover, unlike the White House, where journalists usually camp out.
“You’ve covered me this time much more fairly, I think, than the first term,” Trump said. “The first term was a great success. We had the greatest economy in history in the first term, and this term is going to blow it away. I think this term is going to actually blow it away. So it’s an honor to have you.”
Trump’s comments come just one week after a tense speech at the redo White House Correspondents’ Association dinner where he made controversial comments about CNN primetime anchor and White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins, comparing her to transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
“She’s a young, attractive woman. She never smiles,” Trump said.
He also called Wall Street Journal reporter Josh Dawsey “unhirable.”
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The original dinner in April was disrupted after a gunman breached the security checkpoint at the Washington Hilton.
The president’s comments prompted criticism from journalists, some of whom called for the annual dinner to be rethought moving forward, citing the administration’s aggressive efforts to limit press coverage.