This is no joking matter
Vice President Kamala Harris has decided to dodge former president Trump and skip this year’s Al Smith Dinner — a major election year event that generations of candidates have attended — becoming the first presidential hopeful to duck out since failed presidential wannabe Walter Mondale in 1984.
While Trump has agreed to go to the 79th iteration of the Archdiocese of New York’s dinner on Oct. 17, Harris’s camp says she will instead campaign in key battleground states on the final stretch before election day, her campaign told The Post.
It has been a tradition for both presidential candidates to attend the dinner — at which the contenders take turns giving speeches roasting each other — since Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy appeared together in 1960.
Archdiocese spokesperson Joseph Zwilling told The Post they learned that Harris would not be there on Saturday.
“We are disappointed that she will not be with us, as this is an evening of unity and putting aside political differences in support of a good cause of helping women and children in need regardless of race, creed, or background,” he said.
“We hope she reconsiders.”
Former President Donald Trump’s campaign has since reached out to the Archdiocese and confirmed he will be in attendance, according to Zwilling.
Harris’ team did tell organizers that she would be willing to attend the dinner as President of the United States, if elected.
The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, first held in 1946, rakes in millions of dollars each year to support people in need in The Big Apple.
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While held annually, presidential candidates regularly appear during election years where they typically trade lighthearted jabs in the name of charity.
Harris will be the first to decline an invitation since Jimmy Carter’s Vice President, Walter Mondale declined in 1984 when he ran a losing campaign against President Ronald Reagan, Zwilling said.
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, according to the Associated Press.
Trump had a notable appearance at the dinner in 2016, where he was booed when audience members felt he crossed a line when he called his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton corrupt and said she hated Catholics.
Both Trump and President Biden gave pre-taped video remarks at the first-ever virtual Al Smith Dinner in 2020 during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, but there were few jokes made as they made a last-minute pitch to Catholic voters.
Trump blasted Democrats in his speech as being “anti-Catholic” and highlighted his stance on the key Catholic issue of abortion, calling himself a “defender of the sacred right to life.”
Biden, a practicing Catholic, took a lighter approach at the time and talked about how his faith “helped me through the darkness” at points in his life.
The dinner is named after the former governor of New York, who was the first Roman Catholic ever nominated to run for president by a major party in 1928. This year’s event will be held at the New York Hilton Midtown.
