Good evening from Washington, where Party Animals is weighing whether to break out a tuxedo for an event that is, maddeningly, “black-tie optional.”
The culprit behind this sartorial crisis: Semafor’s annual gala, thrown to cap off their World Economy Summit, the news outlet’s effort to make Davos happen in DC. Last year, I got caught in conversation with Bill de Blasio and Tony P.
The splashy event is a pump-primer for next week, when a horde of hacks and flacks, agents and anchors, eager executives and tech titans descend on Washington for the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.
Vanity Fair, I’m excited to say, will for the first time in years be hosting our own party with CAA. It will be an invitation-only bash at the Belgian ambassador’s residence—a stately Beaux Arts manse overlooking the Potomac.
The weekend will be different this year. President Donald Trump, for the first time in either of his two terms, plans to attend. Which means the denizens of Trumpworld, who normally join the president in shunning the dinner and its appended events, will be out in force.
“Last year, it was sort of heavily implied that if you were a Trump official or Trump ally participating in WHCD activities, that it would be looked down upon,” one top Trump ally texts. “No such thing this year.”
There’s another feature that will make next weekend different. The lead performer at the dinner isn’t a comedian, but Oz Pearlman, a mentalist who has made his fame bamboozling everyone from billionaires like Mark Cuban to podcasters like Joe Rogan with intricate mind games that defy explanation.
Read on for an interview with Pearlman, who says he’s spent the last few months preparing to get inside Trump’s head.
Also mentioned in this issue: Eric Swalwell, Ric Grenell, Grindr, Weijia Jiang, Ashley St. Clair, Jessica Reed Kraus, and more.
Got tips? Hit the Party Animals hotline: aidan_mclaughlin@condenast.com. Or text me—my personal number is 917-817-8266. Complaints will be met with the same contempt as “black-tie optional.” Praise will be added to Washington’s most eligible Grindr bios.
