WASHINGTON – If President Donald Trump isn't comfortable being the target of jokes, comedian Michelle Wolf has given him and others plenty of reasons to squirm.
"It's 2018 and I'm a woman, so you cannot shut me up, unless you have Michael Cohen wire me $130,000," she cracked at the annual dinner of the White House Correspondents' Association on Saturday night.
No, Trump's personal attorney wasn't there. And, for the second year, Trump himself skipped the event, preferring to criticize journalists and others during a campaign-style rally in Michigan.
Wolf, the after-dinner entertainment for the White House press corps and their guests, was surprisingly racy for the venue and seemed more at home on HBO than C-SPAN. After one crass joke drew groans in the Washington Hilton ballroom, she laughed and said, "Yeah, shoulda done more research before you got me to do this."
Trump, noting how Wolf's routine played, observed in a tweet Sunday: "While Washington, Michigan, was a big success, Washington, D.C., just didn't work. Everyone is talking about the fact that the White House Correspondents Dinner was a very big, boring bust ... the so-called comedian really 'bombed.'"
As he did last year, Trump flew to a Republican-friendly district to rally supporters on the same night as the dinner. In Michigan, the president assured his audience he'd rather be there than in that other city by that name.
"Is this better than that phony Washington White House Correspondents' Dinner? Is this more fun?" Trump asked, sparking cheers.
"I could be up there tonight, smiling, like I love where they're hitting you, shot after shot. These people, they hate your guts ... and you've got to smile. If you don't smile, they say, 'He was terrible, he couldn't take it.' And if you do smile, they'll say, "What was he smiling about?'"
Wolf's act had some in the audience laughing and left others in stony silence. A blistering critique of press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who was seated just feet away, mocked everything from her truthfulness to her appearance and Southern roots.
Among Wolf's less off-color one-liners:
-"Just a reminder to everyone, I'm here to make jokes, I have no agenda, I'm not trying to get anything accomplished, so everyone that's here from Congress you should feel right at home."
-"It is kinda crazy that the Trump campaign was in contact with Russia when the Hillary campaign wasn't even in contact with Michigan."
-"He wants to give teachers guns, and I support that because then they can sell them for things they need like supplies."