Trump to attend rescheduled press dinner under tighter security

US President Donald Trump is set to attend the rescheduled White House Correspondents' Dinner on Friday under heightened security, three months after gunshots at the original event led to his evacuation and the dinner's cancellation.

Trump is expected to give the speech he was unable to deliver in April, when shots were fired at the Washington Hilton. California man Cole Allen, 31, has pleaded not guilty to charges including attempting to kill the president.

The US Secret Service has increased security for the new event, closing part of Washington and setting up a large cordon. The venue has been moved from the Hilton to the Waldorf Astoria, a former Trump hotel. Organizers said the change means the dinner will be smaller and more intimate.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that Trump had promised in April to finish the job and plan another dinner, and that he would deliver on that promise. Weijia Jiang, president of the White House Correspondents Association, said in June that the association would not allow an act of violence to have the last word.

Trump had been expected to deliver a strongly critical speech about the media at the original dinner, but the tone of Friday's remarks is not yet clear. In June, Trump said he did not know whether he would give the same "rather nasty statements" about certain people.

Trump's attendance in April was his first at the dinner during either of his two terms as president. The rescheduled dinner is expected to keep a similar program, including a performance by mentalist Oz Pearlman. It will also include a tribute to a Secret Service agent who helped stop the alleged gunman in April despite being hit in his protective vest, and to the Washington Hilton staff.

Secret Service director Sean Curran said the agency was ready for the rescheduled dinner. He said the security system had worked in April because a cordon stopped the alleged attacker from reaching the main hall. Curran also said current threats against top US officials were "off the charts" and that the threat environment was as large as he had seen it.