WASHINGTON.– The president donald trump and senior officials in his administration were abruptly evacuated from the Annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner this saturday night after Explosions will be heard in the hotel lobby where the event took place, in this capital, which forced the activation of the Secret Service security protocol. The president did not suffer injuries.
Attendees — including hundreds of journalists — took cover when they heard the noise, while Secret Service agents They quickly removed the president; his wife, Melania Trump; to Vice President, JD Vanceand other government officials.
None of the officials were injured.while the shooting suspect was arrestedas confirmed by Trump himself, who later spread an image of the aggressor on his social networks. The authorities identified the man in custody as Cole Tomas Allen, 31, resident of Torrance, California. “He is a sick person,” the president later said. “They believe it was a lone wolf”he added.
“It has been an intense night in Washington, DC. The Secret Service and law enforcement have done a fantastic job. They acted quickly and bravely. The shooter has been arrested, and I recommended that the show continue; However, I will be guided entirely by the instructions of law enforcement agencies. They will make a decision shortly,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social account, minutes after being evacuated.
“Regardless of this decision, the evening will be very different from what was planned and, simply, we will have to do it again,” added the Republican president. Then Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt reported that the president gave a press conference at the White House around 10:30 p.m. (local time).
Trump declared that “a man charged a security checkpoint, armed with multiple weapons”and which was then “neutralized by some very brave members of the Secret Service.”
The president, who had arrived a few minutes before the incident, was sitting on the platform at the front of the meeting room. Hilton Hotellocated very close to the White House. The recorded images showed the moment the evacuation took place.
The security forces did not specify the origin of the explosions in the lobby, which led to the hundreds of guests in the central room where the dinner was taking place. They will throw themselves to the ground in confusion.
According to the White House press pool — a group of journalists who travel with the president — a member of the Secret Service yelled “Shots fired!”.
One dinner guest, Erin Thielman, a military veteran, left the room to call her son and heard three loud bangs that I thought were gunshotsI detail the The Wall Street Journal. The woman She saw a man fall right in front of her and he was carrying what appeared to be a rifle and magazines.added the newspaper. Thielman then went downstairs and saw security officers drawing their guns.
The event, organized by the White House Correspondents Association, brings together representatives of the press and authorities every year in one of the most traditional events on the American political calendar.
Organizers initially said they hoped to resume the event.but then they noted that Trump himself – who was scheduled to give a speech tonight – would reschedule it within the next 30 days.
Weijia Jiang, president of the Correspondents Association, finally announced that everyone had to leave the hotel. There was applause when he said the president and first lady were safe. “I saw everyone reporting, and that’s what we do. Thank God, everyone is safe,” he said.
Trump’s attendance at the annual dinner of the White House Correspondents’ Association – his first time as president at the event – was a highly anticipated moment due to the conflictive relationship that the Republican leader maintains with journalists from many media outlets, to whom he usually dedicates strong cryptic messages and attacks.
There was a strong expectation in Washington about what kind of message the president who sued and threatened many American media outlets in front of hundreds of people would convey. journalists most prominent in the country.
Trump and his wife had arrived at the Hilton Hotel on time at 8 p.m. (local time). The guests had only been eating dinner for a few minutes – the starter, buffalo burrata with cucumbers and toasted pistachios had been served – when everything changed in the back of the room.
Then security officers ran at full speed through the hallways towards the stage, where Trump was seated. A sudden panic ensued, and then attendees threw themselves under their seats and tables..
Security personnel, weapons drawn, stormed the stage as the president, Melania Trump and Vance were quickly escorted out.
Additionally, several cabinet members and senior officials on his team were among those in attendance. The Secretary of State, Marco Rubio; the Secretary of War; Pete Hegseth; the secretary of the treasury, Scott Bessent: the director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard; the Secretary of Transportation, Sean Duffy; the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt; the White House Communications Director, Steven Cheung; the director of the FBI, Kash Patel; the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche; the deputy chief of staff and one of the national security advisors, Stephen Millerand the Secretary of Health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.they were in the living room.
“Sounds of gunshots were heard in the back of the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. Secret Service agents ran down the center aisle past me. Shouts from the guests. They took the president and first lady out immediately as we lay on the ground. Some people hid under the tables,” one of the guests, Jennifer Jacobs, of CBS News, wrote in X.
“Stephen Miller protected his pregnant wife, Katieon the ground, until a security officer came to his side. “There was a slight delay in removing some cabinet secretaries,” he added.
The Democratic representative Jared Moskowitz (Florida)who was also at the dinner, commented on the social network X that he was taken to a safe room after hearing loud noises. “I want to thank law enforcement, the Capitol Police,” the legislator said in his post. “Personally, I want to thank Steve Scalise, who took me to a safe room,” he added.
For his part, the Republican representative Andrew Ogles (Tennessee) He stated in a video shared on X that he and two other Republican congressmen present at the event managed to leave the room with the help of the Secret Service. “Pray for our country. Pray for the leaders who were, and perhaps continue to be, in the facilities,” he said, when confusion still reigned in the Washington night.
The speech that the president had planned to deliver would be “very entertaining”Leavitt had advanced this Friday.
“I think it is very appropriate that, on the 250th anniversary of our nation, the most transparent and accessible president will attend the White House Correspondents’ Dinner for the first time, and his speech will be very entertaining, I assure you,” he told the press.
The televised dinner, held at the Washington Hilton hotel, had already been a point of cultural conflict in the past, with Stephen Colbert’s verbal attack on George W. Bush in 2006, or Seth Meyers’ criticism in 2011 of Trump’s presidential ambitions.
