The Trump WHCA Dinner finally happened — and after years of skipped invitations, the evening turned out to be far stranger, warmer and funnier than most people in the ballroom expected.

President Donald Trump appeared at the White House Correspondents Association Dinner on Friday night, marking the first time he had shown up at the event during either of his two terms in office. The gathering had originally been scheduled for April 25 but was postponed after an armed man reportedly charged past security, fired a shot and was tackled into custody in what authorities described as an attempt on the president’s life.

That shared scare hung over the room all evening, and it shaped the tone in unexpected ways. Here are the five moments worth knowing about.

A Rare Truce Between the President and the Press

Trump and the Washington press corps rarely agree on much. Friday night still had its awkward pauses, but there were also stretches of genuine warmth — something almost unheard of at this particular dinner.

Before handing out one of the evening’s awards, ABC’s Jon Karl paused to acknowledge the president’s decision to attend. He noted that for over a century, presidents have willingly sat in rooms full of reporters who ask difficult questions and publish what they find regardless of who it upsets, and he thanked Trump for showing up.

Outgoing WHCA president Weijia Jiang, who emceed the night, struck a similar chord. After speaking about why the First Amendment matters, she turned directly to the president and pointed out that she and many others in the room had covered him for years. When reporters ask, he argues back, she said, and then they argue right back at him. Framing it in language he might appreciate, she called press freedom a deal already closed — and raised a toast to the freedoms that had brought everyone back into the same room after they were nearly taken away by violence.

Trump closed his own remarks on a similarly generous note, telling the crowd he holds real respect for the people in the room. He admitted he does not always feel treated fairly, hedged that maybe sometimes he is, and then thanked the association for the invitation, saying the night had been fun.

Jokes at the Expense of Reporters and His Own Cabinet

Nobody in the room was entirely safe, including the people Trump appointed himself.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took the first hit. After telling guests he hoped they had enjoyed the beef tenderloin, Trump claimed Kennedy had personally hit the cow with his car, butchered it and delivered it to the venue. He added that Kennedy had pitched an appetizer of male raccoon roadkill, but that the White House had firmly declined.

The bit landed because of Kennedy’s well-documented history with wildlife — from stories about roadkill and dismembered animals to viral clips of him handling snakes and the infamous chainsaw incident involving a beached whale on Cape Cod. Kennedy has also become a loud advocate for red meat and beef tallow over seed oils, which made the dinner menu an easy target.

Trump even found humor in the April shooting, joking that when gunfire sent people shouting for everyone to get down, rapper Nicki Minaj began twerking — the only guest, he said, who truly understood the instruction.

He returned repeatedly to his favorite label for the media, and aimed sharper barbs at specific outlets. In one setup that sounded like a foreign policy update about a toppled hostile regime now run by a leader facing internal chaos, he pivoted mid-sentence to wish Bari Weiss well at CBS News. CNN’s Kaitlan Collins also got hit, with a joke about mistaking her for Dylan Mulvaney on a Bud Light can.

A Mind-Reading Act That Left the Room Stunned

The closing entertainment came from mentalist Oz Pearlman, who pulled Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche into an elaborate routine.

Pearlman asked Blanche to invent a dollar figure for the cash in his wallet. Blanche said $130 — Pearlman correctly identified the real amount as $85. A nearby guest then pulled a single bill at random, Blanche signed it, and he was told to sit on it.

The act then moved through the crowd. Audience members, including Fox News’ Kevin Corke, were asked to name someone living or dead they most wanted to interview, and Pearlman guessed correctly again and again. Others, among them U.N. Ambassador Mike Waltz, offered meaningful dates and random figures. Multiplied together, those numbers produced 53,670,682.

Pearlman then asked Blanche to stand and read the serial number on the bill beneath him. It matched exactly.

The Phone Number Experiment That Backfired

Trump also revealed a habit that has quietly reshaped his relationship with reporters. Tired of constantly asking aides Karoline Leavitt and Steven Cheung whether the press had called, he simply started handing out his personal line.

He described it as one of the worst decisions he has made, estimating a call arrives roughly every three or four minutes. Occasionally he picks up for someone he likes — he name-checked Fox News’ Jacqui Heinrich, teasing that she only ever wants to discuss grim topics. More often the caller is from an outlet he has never heard of. He recounted answering to a small startup paper somewhere in Nevada asking for his views on Iran, then hanging up. Even the first lady, he said, cannot believe he lives this way.

He Plans to Return in 2027 — With One Condition

Trump had skipped the dinner for five years across two terms, breaking a tradition built on an uneasy annual truce between officials and the reporters who cover them. That made his appearance the story of the night, especially after April’s chaos.

Roughly an hour and four minutes into his remarks, he addressed next year directly, calling the invitation an honor and saying he was glad to finally be there as president. Asked whether he would come back, he said yes — then added the caveat that if the coverage turns especially brutal, he might reconsider. Still, he insisted, he expects to return.

It is worth noting he has been in that ballroom before. Trump attended in 2011 and 2015, back when he was known as a developer and reality television star rather than a president.