Trump to attend rescheduled correspondents’ dinner

President Donald Trump is expected to return Friday night to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, three months after the annual gala was abruptly halted when a heavily armed man rushed a security checkpoint outside the Washington Hilton ballroom and exchanged gunfire with law enforcement.

The rescheduled dinner will be held at the Waldorf Astoria in Washington, formerly the Trump International Hotel, in a smaller and more heavily secured setting. Trump is scheduled to speak, and several top administration officials are expected to attend.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the president “looks forward to finishing what he started before a despicable assassination attempt derailed the original event back in April,” adding that the evening will be “very entertaining and memorable.” She told NBC News that Trump’s speech would be “a combination of unifying yet vicious, and serious yet hilarious, all at the same time, if you can imagine that.”

A senior White House official told NBC News that Trump is expected to “briefly address” the April violence and may use some jokes written for the original dinner. After the April event was evacuated, Trump said he had planned to sharply criticize the press. “I don’t know if I could ever be as rough as I was going to be tonight,” he said then. “I think I’m going to be probably very nice. I’ll be very boring the next time, but we’re going to have a great event.”

Prosecutors say Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, rushed through a security checkpoint in an apparent effort to reach the ballroom where the dinner was taking place. NBC News reported that Allen was arrested after allegedly exchanging gunfire with law enforcement and has pleaded not guilty to numerous charges, including attempting to assassinate the president. Prosecutors allege he wrote a note to family members saying he was targeting administration officials.

The White House Correspondents’ Association will honor Secret Service Officer Victor Gonzales, who was shot in his protective vest during the attack, and the Washington Hilton staff. “Officer Gonzales played a significant role when he ran toward danger so that thousands of others could make it home safely,” the association said in a news release.

Weijia Jiang, the association’s most recent past president and CBS News’ senior White House correspondent, said the program is “very much the same” as the April event, though smaller. Mentalist Oz Pearlman is scheduled to perform. Jiang told C-SPAN there are “enhanced security measures,” including coordination with a private security firm and the Secret Service. Guests must present a unique QR code and government-issued photo ID, then pass through layers of screening.

“It was incredibly important to have the safety of our guests to be the top priority,” Jiang said.

Secret Service Director Sean Curran said Wednesday that every venue is reevaluated before each presidential visit. “We will always evaluate every site,” he said, adding that an advance team was already at the venue. “That is a success.” CBS News reported that Secret Service officials have warned of unprecedented nationwide threats, with agents opening roughly 10,000 protective intelligence cases since January, nearly 40% more than the same period last year.

The Waldorf Astoria event space is smaller than the Washington Hilton ballroom, which NBC News reported holds more than 3,000 people. NBC said the Waldorf space holds about 700 people, while Al Jazeera, citing the New York Post, reported the ballroom holds about 1,000.

Leavitt, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are expected to attend, NBC reported. First lady Melania Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are not expected to attend the second dinner.