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The White House Correspondents’ Dinner has been rescheduled after a gunman tried to assassinate Donald Trump at the event – and the President says he’s going.
The original event in late April was ruined after gunman Cole Allen, 31, stormed past a Secret Service checkpoint wielding a shotgun, handgun and multiple knives.
The dinner has since been rescheduled for July 24, according to the White House Correspondents’ Association, which organizes the annual do.
‘In a sign of strength and fortitude, it was just announced that the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, which violently ended rather abruptly on April 25th, will be rescheduled to July 24th,’ Trump posted on social media Tuesday afternoon.
‘This announcement is a very good thing in that we cannot allow Lunatics to change our way of life, or even its scheduling. I was asked to be there, and speak, by Weijia Jiang, President of The White House Correspondents’ Association, and have accepted.’
Trump revealed that the event will be hosted at his former Washington, DC, hotel, now the Waldorf Astoria.
‘In any event, it will be a “HOT” ticket! Interestingly, the location will be The Waldorf Astoria, on Pennsylvania Avenue, a Building and Ballroom that I built.’
He noted that he may have to redo his speech, floating, ‘I don’t know whether or not I will give the same rather nasty statements, at least as it concerns certain people, but we will soon find out.’
First Lady Melania Trump and President Donald Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner at the Washington Hilton in April, before shots rang out
Cole Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, took this selfie before allegedly breaching a security checkpoint with a shotgun, handgun and multiple knives at the event. He is currently in pretrial detention in Washington, DC, while facing charges that could land him in prison for life
The rescheduled dinner will take place at the Waldorf Astoria in Washington, DC, a hotel that was formerly owned by Trump, on July 24
Allen is currently serving pretrial detention in Washington; he faces life in prison on charges of attempted assassination of a US President, among others.
Cole allegedly shot a Secret Service agent while sprinting through a magnetometer and was immediately apprehended.
Secret Service opened fire on Cole, startling the dinner attendees in an adjacent room, prompting many to dive for cover under their tables.
Later that evening, Trump gave a press conference from the White House Press Briefing room – still wearing his tuxedo – where he said he would like to see the dinner rescheduled within 30 days.
The WHCA said in its email that the rescheduled dinner will feature enhanced security and screening processes after many were left wondering how Allen was able to infiltrate the venue heavily armed.
‘The event will feature significantly enhanced safety measures and new access procedures,’ Jiang said in her email to WHCA members.
The re-run will also ‘be a more intimate gathering,’ presumably with less guests, according to the dispatch.
The dinner has been held annually for over a century and is meant as a celebration of the First Amendment and US citizens’ freedom of speech rights.
