US PRESIDENT Donald Trump has proved he actually does have a sense of humour about himself by joking at the annual Gridiron Club dinner in Washington DC about his recent staff issues and a meeting with Kim Jong-un.

The New York Post reports that Mr Trump started his speech, which was at a bipartisan dinner with the press, by joking about the departure of communications director Hope Hicks and his son-in-law Jared Kushner having his security clearance downgraded.

“Another calm week at the White House,” he said, “we finally have it running like a finetuned machine.”

“We were late tonight because Jared could not get through security,” Mr Trump joked.

“So many people have been leaving the White House. It’s invigorating since you want turnover. I like chaos. It really is good. Who’s going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller, or Melania?”

Mr Trump said his staff were worried that he couldn’t do self deprecating humour, to which he joked “I told them not to worry. Nobody does self deprecating humour better than I do.”

He also poked fun at himself, saying he talk to Kim Jong-un but that the North Korean dictator would be facing “the risk of dealing with a madman.’’

Mr Trump said that he’d offered Jeff Sessions a ride to the dinner, but that the attorney general had “recused himself”, a gag about the frosty relationship between the pair since Sessions recused himself from the Russia probe.

Mr Trump then had some jokes about the media, starting by calling them “quality people.”

“It’s been a very tough year for CNN. They’ve lost a tremendous amount of credibility this year. And your best reporter, Steve Bannon. That guy leaked more than the Titanic. Boy did he leak,” he said.

He said Vice President Mike Pence’s comedy talent was as a straight man, adding “He is very straight!”

“I really am very proud to call him The Apprentice,” Mr Trump said of his VP. “But lately he’s showing a particularly keen interest in the news these days. He is asking has he been impeached yet? I don’t like that.”

Every president since Grover Cleveland has come to at least one Gridiron dinner with the event tracing its history to 1885.

Ivanka Trump and husband Jared Kushner were in attendance.