President Donald Trump hastily left the White House Correspondents’ Dinner at a Washington, D.C., hotel after a gunman opened fire and tried to breach security.
The US President, First Lady Melania Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, and members of the Cabinet were not injured after the shooting at the Washington Hilton Hotel.
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A security guard was shot but was protected by a bulletproof vest. President Trump said, “I’m feeling very well.”
The White House said the suspect, identified as 31-year-old Cole Thomas Allen from California, is in custody. Trump said he was heavily armed and appeared to be acting alone.
The White House Correspondents’ Dinner is scheduled to be postponed in 30 days.
Here’s what you need to know about the shooting and the suspect.
What happened to Trump?
The president was hosting the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner Saturday night at the Washington Hilton Hotel.
The dinner is an annual tradition in which journalists covering the White House join the president and other U.S. leaders to celebrate the First Amendment and raise money for journalism scholarships.
However, the celebration was interrupted by a sudden gunshot, and Secret Service agents rushed the president outside.
An FBI official told Reuters that a man with a shotgun opened fire on Secret Service agents. The employee was struck but was unharmed because he was in the area covered in protective gear, officials said.
Al Jazeera’s Chris Sheridan, reporting from Washington, D.C., said everyone was eating and socializing when suddenly gunshots were heard.
“I thought it was coming from behind where we were sitting, but it was pretty loud. It was an echo. There were at least five shots, pretty loud, and it echoed throughout the ballroom right outside where we were,” he said.
Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher noted a very unusual night at the White House.
“It’s not often that you see a president rise up from an assassination attempt and walk into a briefing room to give an update to the media, all dressed in their finest clothes,” he said from Washington, D.C.
The Hilton Hotel is no stranger to assassination attempts and is also known as the Reagan Hotel after John Hinckley Jr. attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan in 1981. It is this incident, rather than the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner, that the hotel is perhaps most famous for.
Al Jazeera’s Fisher said President Trump seemed quite surprised by the news.
“At first he thought it was a dropped tray or a gunshot, but Secret Service agents, along with the first lady and members of the Cabinet, removed him from the hall.”
He noted that President Trump had made it clear he wanted the event to continue, but the Secret Service would not allow it.
Is playing cards safe?
All U.S. federal employees, including President Trump, were declared safe.
About an hour after Trump rushed out of the event, he posted on Truth Social: “The shooter has been arrested.”
President Trump added: “It was a great night in Washington, D.C. The Secret Service and law enforcement did a great job.”
President Trump said he had been asked to leave the dinner and would reschedule it.
“The first lady, the vice president and all members of the Cabinet are in perfect health,” he said. “We have spoken with all those responsible for the event and will be rescheduling it within 30 days.”
Shortly afterward, President Trump praised the courage of the Secret Service agents, telling reporters in the United States that they were “shot at close range with a very powerful weapon, but the vest did its job.”
“I spoke to the police officer and I told him he’s fine. He’s feeling great. He’s doing great. We told him we love him and respect him,” he said.
Who is the suspected gunman?
The New York Times and CBS News identified the suspect as 31-year-old Cole Thomas Allen.
Al Jazeera’s Richard Gaisford, reporting from Washington, D.C., said authorities have not released the name of the suspect in custody, but he has been identified in various news reports.
“This appears to have been gleaned from information he gave when he checked into the Washington Hilton prior to this event. He has a room at the hotel and is named Cole Thomas Allen, from a place in California called Torrance. He is 31 years old,” he said.
“We saw footage of him rushing past a police line to get into the ballroom, where, of course, President Donald Trump was sitting near his wife, Melania Trump, other members of the Cabinet, and all the members of the press who had gathered for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner,” he added.
Gaisford noted that some photos show the gunman almost half-naked because he had been stripped by police to ensure he was not carrying explosives.
President Trump described him as a “sick” man.
“The man was captured. They broke into his apartment. He probably lives in California, but he’s a sick man. A very sick man. And we don’t want something like this to happen,” the president told US media.
The incident was traumatic for the first lady, who added that the law enforcement response was “absolutely incredible.”
“We’re going to reschedule. We’re going to do it all over again. We’re not going to let anyone take over our society. We’re not going to cancel things.”
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told U.S. reporters that the investigation is “ongoing.”
“I expect charges to be filed in the near future. Given the conduct, the charges should be obvious, but as you can hear, there will be multiple charges related to shooting, firearm possession, and anything else that we can figure out about this man,” Blanche said.
Has President Trump been attacked in the past?
Trump has faced numerous assassination attempts and death threats over his years as president and candidate.
The most dangerous incident occurred in July 2024 at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a man with a gun climbed onto a nearby rooftop in a position that looked directly at then-candidate Trump as he spoke from the podium. The attack killed one bystander and injured Trump’s ear. Investigators shot the suspect, Thomas Crooks, 20, at the scene.
A few months later, in September, an armed man hid near Trump’s West Palm Beach golf course in Florida with the intention of killing him, officials said. Prosecutors said Ryan Routh carefully planned the killing for weeks before pointing his rifle at a shrubbery where Trump was playing golf. Before firing at President Trump, Secret Service agents spotted Routh and arrested him a short distance away. Routh was convicted last year of attempted murder of the president and sentenced to life in prison in February.
In February, 21-year-old Austin Tucker Martin was shot and killed after entering Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida with a shotgun, but the president was not there.
