Trump attends Al Smith dinner with Melania, Harris appears virtually
Former President Donald Trump traded the rally stage for comedy Thursday night as he headlined the annual Al Smith charity dinner, where he was jeered eight years ago while delivering an especially pointed speech.
Video above: Former President Trump jokes about subpoenas at Al Smith Dinner
Vice President Kamala Harris skipped attending the event in person as she campaigned in Wisconsin, breaking with presidential tradition. But she appeared onscreen in a recorded video.
The white tie dinner in New York raises millions of dollars for Catholic charities and has traditionally offered candidates from both parties the chance to trade light-hearted barbs, poke fun at themselves, and show that they can get along — or at least pretend to — for one night in the election's final stretch.
It's often the last time the two nominees share a stage before Election Day.
Trump was joined at the dinner by his wife, Melania, who has been an infrequent presence on the campaign trail.
The dais included a mix of Trump allies and foes. Joining him onstage was New York Attorney General Letitia James, who brought a successful civil fraud case against Trump and his business. New York's embattled mayor, Eric Adams and other top city officials, as well as business leaders and sports and media personalities, were also in attendance. Adams was charged last month with accepting illegal campaign contributions and lavish overseas trips from Turkish officials and businesspeople. Former New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was booed when he was announced.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who endorsed Trump after dropping his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, attended with his wife, Cheryl Hines. New York magazine placed one of its star correspondents on leave after she acknowledged having a personal relationship with a former reporting subject, who several media outlets have identified as Kennedy.
The dinner was emceed by comedian Jim Gaffigan, who plays Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz on "Saturday Night Live." Gaffigan has a history of criticizing Trump.
In 2020, he wrote on X , then known as Twitter: "We need to wake up. We need to call trump the con man and thief that he is."
In her video, Harris appeared alongside comedian and actress Molly Shannon, who reprised her long-running "Saturday Night Live" character Mary Katherine Gallagher, an awkward Catholic schoolgirl. She also poked fun at Trump for comments he made in Michigan, saying that mocking Catholics in the video would be "like criticizing Detroit in Detroit."
Harris' campaign had previously said that, with less than three weeks before Election Day, they wanted her to spend as much time as possible campaigning in battleground states that will decide the election, rather than detouring to heavily Democratic New York. Her team has told organizers that she would be willing to attend the dinner as president if she wins. The Daily Caller was first to report that Harris would address the dinner by screen.
Harris's decision not to attend drew some boos from the crowd when organizers noted it. Trump received a mixed welcome.
Trump had blasted Harris for declining to attend, accusing her in a social media post of being anti-Catholic. "Any Catholic that votes for Comrade Kamala Harris should have their head examined," he wrote.
That was the kind of tone that drew boos in 2016 when Trump appeared at the dinner with his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, and unleashed a particularly nasty speech, calling her "corrupt" and accusing her of "pretending not to hate Catholics."
Trump's 2016 speech, delivered the night after their final debate, had begun on a less hostile tone.
After noting that these kinds of dinner remarks typically begin with a self-deprecating joke, he quipped that he was "actually a modest person."
But Trump's remarks soon veered into bitterness as he turned to the investigation into Clinton's use of a private email server as secretary of state and he praised "the wonder of WikiLeaks" for its revelations.
"Hillary believes that it's vital to deceive the people by having one public policy and a totally different policy in private," he said to jeers. "For example, here she is tonight, in public, pretending not to hate Catholics."
Mary Callahan Erdoes, vice chair of the foundation, alluded to the reception when she introduced Trump.
"You never disappoint. Your wit is absolutely fabulous. And all of us together are going to hope for the best," she quipped to laughs.
Trump's sense of humor is often cited by his supporters as key to his appeal. While he infamously glowered through former President Obama's jokes at his expense during the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner, he also sometimes pokes fun at himself.
At several rallies this year, he has remarked on his hair after catching a glimpse of himself on screen.
"What the hell can you do. There's nothing I can do about it. We're stuck with it," he joked at a rally in Indiana, Pennsylvania last month.
Both Trump and President Joe Biden, who is Catholic, spoke at a virtual version of the fundraiser in 2020, which was moved online due to concerns over large gatherings at the height of the pandemic.
The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner is named for the former New York governor, a Democrat who was the first Catholic to receive a major party nomination for president when he unsuccessfully ran for the White House in 1928.
The event has become a tradition for presidential candidates since Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy appeared together in 1960. In 1996, the Archdiocese of New York decided not to invite then-President Bill Clinton and his Republican challenger, Bob Dole, reportedly because Clinton vetoed a late-term abortion ban.
