Details Emerge After White House Correspondents’ Dinner Shooting

The organizers of this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner undoubtedly expected to make headlines as the first such event President Trump has attended while president, but the event filled with journalists, Cabinet officials, and high-profile businesspeople got attention this weekend, not for witty barbs or feats by its mentalist host, but for being disrupted by a shooter.

A Secret Service agent by the entrance to the DC event, who was wearing a bulletproof vest, was shot before the suspected gunman was swiftly apprehended by law enforcement (the agent is reportedly in good condition).

• However, Attorney General Todd Blanche said yesterday that Trump and his Cabinet officials were likely the intended targets.
• The alleged shooter was said to have written a “manifesto” and left behind writings denouncing the administration’s policies in his hotel room.

The suspect was identified by law enforcement as Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, CA. President Trump described him as a “lone wolf” and “a very sick person.” The interim chief of the DC police said he was armed with a shotgun, a handgun, and knives. He is expected to be charged in federal court today.

The president was whisked away from the event after shots were fired shortly before dinner was scheduled to be served, just as the mentalist was trying to guess the name of Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s soon-to-be-born baby. The event is expected to be rescheduled.

Undeterred, Trump wants to have a ball(room)

The shooting has raised questions about security in the hotel—which happens to be the same one where President Ronald Reagan also survived an attempted shooting in 1981—as there was security around the ballroom, but not the entrance to the hotel itself. And Trump said the concerns demonstrated why the $400 million ballroom he is seeking to add to the White House is needed.

The president has raised money for the ballroom from donors that include Amazon, Lockheed Martin, Palantir, Google, and others, and demolished the East Wing to prepare for its construction. The project has been stop–start: Earlier this month, construction was temporarily halted by a federal court, which found it needed congressional approval.

But…even if the White House ballroom were completed, a private event like the Correspondents’ Dinner is unlikely to be held there.—AR