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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is addressing reporters at the White House after he and other top leaders of the United States were evacuated from an annual dinner of White House correspondents on Saturday night after a shooting incident outside the ballroom.
The shooting suspect was identified as Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press.
Trump said the suspect was armed with multiple weapons before stopped by Secret Service. One officer was shot, but he was protected by a bulletproof vest.
“He was shot from very close distance with a very powerful gun, and the vest did the job,” Trump said.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was uninjured and other top leaders of the United States were evacuated from an annual dinner of White House correspondents on Saturday night after a shooting incident outside the ballroom.
One law enforcement official said a gunman had opened fire. A law enforcement officer was shot in the bullet-resistant vest but is expected to be OK, one officer told The Associated Press.
The FBI said a suspect was in custody but had no details.
The Secret Service and other authorities swarmed the banquet hall at the Washington Hilton as guests ducked under tables by the hundreds. Audible gasps echoed through the ballroom as guests realized something was happening. Hundreds of journalists got on phones to call in information.
“Out of the way, sir!” someone yelled. Others yelled to duck. From one corner, a “God Bless America” chant began as the president was escorted offstage. He fell briefly — he apparently tripped — and was helped up by Secret Service agents. Outside the hotel, members of the National Guard and other authorities flooded the area as helicopters circled overhead.
Authorities said the incident occurred outside the subterranean ballroom where Trump and other guests were seated. After an initial attempt to resume, the event was scrapped for the night and will be rescheduled.
“We will do this again,” said Weijia Jiang, president of the White House Correspondents’ Association. Shortly afterward, staff began breaking down table settings and the presidential lectern.
All officials protected by the Secret Service were evacuated. Those in attendance included Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio — and many other leaders of the Trump administration.
House Speaker Mike Johnson said he and his wife, Kelly, who both attended the event, were “praying for our country tonight.” The House Democratic leader, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, said “The violence and chaos in America must end.”
Reports of hearing shots fired
Some in the crowd reported hearing what they believed to be five to eight shots fired. The banquet hall — where hundreds of prominent journalists, celebrities and national leaders were awaiting Trump’s remarks — was immediately evacuated. Members of the National Guard took up position inside the building as people were allowed to leave but not immediately reenter. Security outside was also extremely tight.
Republican Rep. MIke Lawler of New York, a guest at the dinner, said he heard a pop and “we didn’t know what the hell it was. And then you heard all sorts of things clatter.” Lawler said he gets “death threats often” and said “I think we live in a climate where everybody recognizes its a problem, but I don’t think people fully appreciate how much of a problem it really is.”
The event had initially appeared set to resume after the disorder. Servers refolded napkins and refilled water glasses in preparation for Trump’s return. Another worker prepared the president’s teleprompter for the remarks he was scheduled to make.
Generally, the Hilton hotel, where the dinner has taken place for years, remains open to regular guests during the correspondents’ dinner, and security has typically been focused on the ballroom and rather than the hotel at large, with little screening for people not entering the dinner itself. In past years, that has created openings for disruptions in the lobby and other public spaces, including protests in which security moved to remove guests who unfurled banners or staged demonstrations.
Event was about to take place
Trump’s attendance at Saturday’s annual dinner in Washington for his first time as president is putting his administration’s often-contentious relationship with the press on full public display.
Trump arrived to an event where the leaders of a nation at war mingled with celebrities, journalists and even a puppet — Triumph the Insult Comic Dog — in a dinner that typically generates debate about whether the relationship between journalists and their sources should include socializing together and putting aside sometimes adversarial relationships.
Trump was being watched closely at the event held by the organization of reporters who cover him and his administration. Past presidents who have attended have generally spoken about the importance of free speech and the First Amendment, adding in some light roasts about individual journalists.
The Republican president did not attend during his first term or the first year of his second. He came as a guest in 2011, sitting in the audience as President Barack Obama, a Democrat, made some jokes about the New York real estate developer. Trump also attended as a private citizen in 2015.
Trump entered the banquet hall of the Washington Hilton to the strains of “Hail to the Chief” and greeted prominent journalists on the dais, also pausing to laud White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt with a cheerful pointing of his finger.
Past dinners have also featured comedians who poke at presidents. This year, the group opted to hire mentalist Oz Pearlman as the featured entertainment.
A contentious relationship
Between berating individual reporters, fighting organizations like The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Associated Press in court and restricting press access to the Pentagon, the administration’s animus toward journalists has been a fixture of Trump’s second term.
On the eve of the dinner, nearly 500 retired journalists signed a petition calling on the association “to forcefully demonstrate opposition to President Trump’s efforts to trample freedom of the press.”
Jiang said the organization was fighting for all different forms of the press that have a line in to the American people. “I don’t think people realize how closely we are working with the White House,” she said on C-SPAN before the dinner convened. “The relationship is important. It can be complicated. It can be intense. But it is robust.”
Welcoming guests, Jiang alluded to the contentious relationship in thanking Leavitt “for everything your team does to work with us every day, whether you like it or not.”
Veteran reporter Manu Raju of CNN, as he entered the Washington Hilton for the dinner, said it was not his role to express his opinion on Trump’s relationship with the press. “I’m not an activist,” he said. “My job is not to protest.”
A few dozen protesters stood across the hotel in the runup to the event. One was dressed in a prison uniform, wearing a Hegseth mask and red gloves. Another carried a sign saying, “Journalism is dead.”
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AP journalists Michael Balsamo, Zeke Miller and Anna Johnson contributed to this report. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.
EARLIER REPORT
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was reported uninjured and other top leaders of the United States were evacuated from an annual dinner of White House correspondents on Saturday night after an unspecified threat. There did not immediately appear to be any injuries, and one law-enforcement official said a shooter opened fire.
The Secret Service and other authorities swarmed the banquet hall at the Washington Hilton as guests ducked under tables by the hundreds. “Out of the way, sir!” someone yelled. Others yelled to duck.
Some in the crowd reported hearing what they believed to be five to eight shots fired. The banquet hall — where hundreds of prominent journalists, celebrities and national leaders were awaiting Trump’s speech — was immediately evacuated. Members of the National Guard took up position inside the building as people were allowed to leave but not re-enter. Security outside was also extremely tight.
It was not immediately clear what happened. A law enforcement official confirmed there was a shooter but no further details were immediately available.
Those in attendance included Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier stories follow below.
President Donald Trump and other top leaders of the United States were evacuated from an annual dinner of White House correspondents on Saturday night after an unspecified threat. There did not immediately appear to be any injuries.
The Secret Service and other authorities swarmed the banquet hall as guests ducked under tables by the hundreds. “Out of the way, sir!” someone yelled. Others yelled to duck.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Donald Trump’s attendance at Saturday’s annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in Washington for his first time as president is putting his administration’s often-contentious relationship with the press on full public display.
Trump arrived Saturday night to an event where the leaders of a nation at war mingled with celebrities, journalists and even a puppet — Triumph the Insult Comic Dog — in a dinner that typically generates debate about whether the relationship between journalists and their sources should include socializing together and putting aside sometimes adversarial relationships.
Trump was being watched closely at the event held by the organization of reporters who cover him and his administration. Past presidents who have attended have generally spoken about the importance of free speech and the First Amendment, adding in some light roasts about individual journalists.
The Republican president did not attend during his first term or the first year of his second. He came as a guest in 2011, sitting in the audience as President Barack Obama, a Democrat, made some jokes about the New York real estate developer. Trump also attended as a private citizen in 2015.
Trump entered the subterranean banquet hall of the Washington Hilton to the strains of “Hail to the Chief” and greeted prominent journalists on the dais, also pausing to laud White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt with a cheerful pointing of his finger.
Past dinners have also featured comedians who poke at presidents. This year, the group opted to hire mentalist Oz Pearlman as the featured entertainment.
Trump’s appearance is rekindling a longer running debate about the dinner and events like it — in particular, whether it is poor form for journalists to be seen socializing with the people they cover. The New York Times, for example, stopped attending the dinner more than a decade ago for that reason.
“What was once (a fairly long time ago) a well-intended night of fundraising and camaraderie among professional adversaries is now simply a bad look,” wrote Kelly McBride, ethics expert at the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank.
A contentious relationship
Between berating individual reporters, fighting organizations like the Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Associated Press in court and restricting press access to the Pentagon, the administration’s animus toward journalists has been a fixture of Trump’s second term.
On the eve of the dinner, nearly 500 retired journalists signed a petition calling on the association “to forcefully demonstrate opposition to President Trump’s efforts to trample freedom of the press.”
The WHCA president, CBS News reporter Weijia Jiang, said the organization was fighting for all different forms of the press that have a line in to the American people. “I don’t think people realize how closely we are working with the White House,” she said on CSPAN before the dinner convened. “The relationship is important. It can be complicated. It can be intense. But it is robust.”
Welcoming guests, Jiang alluded to the contentious relationship in thanking Leavitt “for everything your team does to work with us every day, whether you like it or not.”
Veteran reporter Manu Raju of CNN, as he entered the Washington Hilton for the dinner, said it was not his role to express his opinion on Trump’s relationship with the press. “I’m not an activist,” he said. “My job is not to protest.”
A few dozen protesters stood across the hotel in the runup to the event. One was dressed in a prison uniform, wearing a Pete Hegseth mask and red gloves. Another carried a sign saying “Journalism is dead.”
Many reporters who attend consider it a valuable opportunity to get story ideas and establish personal connections with those in government, one that may pay dividends with returned telephone calls in the future.
Some news organizations invite sources as guests
Journalists often invite sources as guests at the dinner. It will be noticed Saturday whether administration officials who have also expressed hostility to the press will attend, and with whom they will be sitting. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he was invited by the New York Post; Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were NBC guests.
The Associated Press invited a former Trump official that it sued last year. Taylor Budowich, a former White House deputy chief of staff who crafted communications policy, was a named defendant last year when the AP sued the administration after it reduced its access to the president because the news outlet did not follow Trump’s lead in renaming the Gulf of Mexico.
“We maintain professional relationships with people across the political spectrum because we are nonpartisan by design — focused on reporting the facts in the public’s interest,” AP spokesman Patrick Maks said.
The White House correspondents will also hand out awards for exemplary reporting. That includes some stories that displeased Trump, such as one from the Journal about a birthday message Trump once sent to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The story led to a presidential lawsuit.
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AP journalists Alanna Durkin Richer and Sagar Meghani in Washington contributed to this report. David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for The Associated Press. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.
