President Obama's Best Jokes at the White House Correspondents Dinner

By Feroze Dhanoa | Patch Staff

Flanked by celebrities and journalism elite, President Obama gave his final monologue at the 2016 White House Correspondents' Dinner, taking jabs at everyone from the Republicans to Hillary Clinton and even made a slighted reference to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's poor choice of joke.

Let's take a look at some of Obama's best quips from the night:

On Republicans

For the few Republicans in attendance, Obama took every opportunity to poke fun at the party. Addressing GOP chairman Reince Priebus, Obama said he was glad to see that he felt he had earned a night off.

"Congratulations on all your success, the Republican Party, the nomination process, it's all going great, keep it up," he said.

And that was not the end. He took another opportunity later in the evening to joke about the nomination process on the Republican side.

"Just look at the confusion over the invitations to tonight's dinner," Obama said. "Guests were asked to check whether they wanted steak or fish but instead a whole bunch of you wrote in Paul Ryan."

On Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders

Obama called Sanders, "the bright new face of the Democratic Party." He did express disappointment at the face that Sanders had been distancing himself from him.

"I mean that's just not something that you do to your comrade," Obama said.

He commended Sanders on his appeal to young voters but said Clinton did not have the same effect, comparing her trying to reach out to young voters to the equivalent of an old relative that just joined Facebook.

Obama had a few more words for Clinton, saying he might use his material from the dinner at Goldman Sachs next year and earn some serious Tubmans.

He did however make it clear that he believes Clinton will be the next president. When wondering who would be standing at the podium next year he told the crowd its, "anyone's guess who she would be."

On Journalism

Obama made a few references throughout the night to the changing face of the media.

"Every year at this dinner, somebody makes a joke about BuzzFeed for example changing the media landscape and every year the Washington Post laughs a little bit less hard," he said. "There's kind of a silence there, especially from the Washington Post table."

He called, "Spotlight," the award-winning film that followed the story of how a group of reporters at the Boston Globe uncovered decades long abuse in the Catholic church, "the best fantasy film since Star Wars," remarking at how reporters in that generation had the time and resources to hunt down the truth.

On Donald Trump

Before he could declare "Obama Out," the President made sure he spoke about Donald Trump, mulling over why he rejected the invitation to attend the dinner.

Obama wondered what Trump was doing instead "eating Trump steak?," or ,"tweeting insults at Angela Merkel?"

He gave the Donald some credit on his foreign policy experience since "he has spent years meeting with leaders from around the world: Miss Sweden, Miss Argentina, Miss Azerbaijan."

He also said Trump might have some success in closing down Guantanamo Bay since he knows a thing or two about running waterfront properties into the ground.

Following the media's example, Obama said he would show some restraint when talking about the Donald since, "he's gotten the appropriate amount of coverage, befitting the seriousness of his candidacy."

"I hope you all are proud of yourselves," he said.

Post-Presidency

The Obamas will be staying in Washington post-presidency. To show what the President might do with all his free time, he starred alongside former speaker of the house John Boehner in "Couch Commander."

Taking on a more serious note at the end, Obama addressed the press corps saying while they may have differences due to their institutional roles, they share the same goal, "to root our public discourse in the truth."

He honored formerly imprisoned Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian calling him a living testament to the very idea of a free press.

And with that, "Obama out."

Watch the full speech.