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Kenan Thompson to host White House correspondents’ dinner with guest Hasan Minhaj

The White House Correspondents' Association announced Monday that Kenan Thompson will headline its annual dinner on April 25, with former host Hasan Minhaj joining him as a featured entertainer.

Kenan Thompson presents the award for outstanding drama series at the 70th Primetime Emmy Awards at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles in 2018. Thompson of “Saturday Night Live” and Hasan Minhaj of Netflix’s “Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj” will headline this year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
Kenan Thompson presents the award for outstanding drama series at the 70th Primetime Emmy Awards at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles in 2018. Thompson of “Saturday Night Live” and Hasan Minhaj of Netflix’s “Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj” will headline this year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner.Read moreChris Pizzello / Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

The White House Correspondents' Association announced Monday that Kenan Thompson will headline its annual dinner on April 25, with former host Hasan Minhaj joining him as a featured entertainer.

Thompson is the latest in a long line of "Saturday Night Live" stars to land the gig; his current castmate Cecily Strong hosted five years ago, and former castmate Seth Meyers did so a few years before. President Donald Trump did not attend the dinner when Minhaj hosted in 2017, making him the first president to skip the event since 1981, when Ronald Reagan was recovering from an assassination attempt.

Enlisting professional comedians to anchor the night marks a return to tradition, as the WHCA took a left turn last year by inviting historian Ron Chernow instead. His remarks, while taking digs at the absent president, remained quite tame - a clear effort on the organization's part to quell any anxieties sparked by the previous dinner's host, former "Daily Show" correspondent Michelle Wolf. Wolf's edgy routine proved controversial, largely over her joke that former White House press secretary Sarah Sanders "burns facts and then ... uses that ash to create a perfect smokey eye."

On his decision to choose Chernow, former WHCA president Olivier Knox said he "felt that the dinner needed a reset." Knox's successor, Jonathan Karl, chief White House correspondent for ABC News, said in a statement Monday that he was "thrilled" to have Thompson and Minhaj perform.

“Kenan and Hasan are two of the most engaged and engaging entertainers in America,” he stated. “We’re looking forward to a lively evening honoring the most important political journalism of the past year.”