A gunman charged a security checkpoint at the White House correspondents’ dinner Saturday night at the Washington Hilton, exchanging gunfire with law enforcement before being subdued and taken into custody. President Trump and other senior administration officials were abruptly evacuated from the ballroom as Secret Service agents swarmed the venue and some attendees ducked under their tables. The suspect has been identified as 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen from Torrance, California. He had checked into the hotel the day before, traveling by train from Los Angeles to Washington. Allen is expected to be formally charged in court today. He reportedly left behind a written manifesto in which he stated he wanted to target officials in the Trump administration. In his so-called manifesto, the suspected gunman does not mention President Trump by name but writes, “I am a citizen of the United States of America. What my representatives do reflects on me. And I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes.” In an interview with “60 Minutes,” President Trump became defensive when host Norah O’Donnell read an excerpt of the suspect’s manifesto.
President Donald Trump: “I’m not a pedophile.”
Norah O’Donnell: “Do you think he was referring to you?”
President Donald Trump: “Excuse me. Excuse me. I’m not a pedophile. You
read that crap from some sick person. I got associated with all — stuff that has nothing to do with me. I was totally exonerated. Your friends on the other side of the plate are the ones that were involved with, let’s say, Epstein or other things. But I said to myself, 'You know, I'll do this interview, and they’ll probably’ — I read the manifesto. You know, he’s a sick person. But you should be ashamed of yourself reading that, because I’m not any of those things.
Norah O’Donnell: “Mr. President, these are the gunman’s words.”
President Donald Trump: “And I was never — excuse me. Excuse me. You shouldn’t be reading that on '60 Minutes.' You’re a disgrace.”
Trump quickly moved to use the incident to promote the massive new ballroom he is constructing on the White House grounds, posting on Truth Social Sunday morning, “This event would never have happened with the Military Top Secret Ballroom currently under construction at the White House. It cannot be built fast enough!” The Justice Department also used the shooting at the White House correspondents’ dinner to try to pressure the National Trust for Historic Preservation to drop their lawsuit against Trump’s $400 million ballroom project. Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate gave the trust until 9 a.m. today to dismiss its lawsuit, writing in a letter that the ballroom “will ensure the safety and security of the President for decades to come and prevent future assassination attempts on the President at the Washington Hilton.”
Meanwhile, on Sunday, nine people were injured in a mass shooting near the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington.
Media Options