Why Samantha Bee brought "Not The White House Correspondents' Dinner" back
Comedian Samantha Bee hosted her first "Not The White House Correspondents' Dinner" back in 2017 as an alternative to the official event that honors political reporters and, in years before Trump took office, was typically attended by the president. Mr. Trump will be skipping the annual fundraiser for the third year in a row.
Bee told "CBS This Morning" that she "didn't think it would be necessary" to hold another one but then learned that this year's featured speaker would be historian Ron Chernow in lieu of a comedian. So for the second time, the host of "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee" will host her own dinner, to air at the same time.
Bee promises a long list of celebrity guests, great music and, most importantly, a fun night.
"Ultimately, we are honoring journalists, and journalism is under siege for sure so we want to highlight that. But ultimately we want to have a fun night," Bee said. "We want to provide an alternative event that is joyful and celebratory and ridiculous."
Bee has spent more than 15 years of her life doing political humor, first as a correspondent for "The Daily Show" before getting tapped to host her own weekly, late-night series that focuses on stories inside and outside of Washington.
What's changed under President Trump, Bee said, is the sheer volume of news people are tasked with digesting.
"It feels insurmountable," she said. "It really is. It's like a firehose of news. You know we're not spending the amount of time we used to when I worked at 'The Daily Show.'"
One of the biggest headlines from last week was the release of the redacted Mueller report. "CBS This Morning" co-host Gayle King asked how she and her team approached covering it when you have people who want to know about it, but a lot of other folks who are tired of hearing about it, too.
"I feel like it's a difficult one," Bee said. "I'm not sure that people – I mean, people have been really groomed. People are really being groomed in this administration to not take things seriously and to not let stories sit with them and to not let things stick and I find that very distressing. It's incredibly distressing. I don't know how you navigate it. We have to just keep bringing these – we just have to keep presenting them to people and hoping they will impact."
One thing she's certain of? She'll "literally never" run out of material.