Trump says he 'wasn't worried' during correspondents' dinner shooting, calls suspect a 'sick person'

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Trump calls U.S. Presidency a ‘dangerous profession’

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Cole Tomas Allen, a 31-year-old from California, was identified as the suspect in the Saturday shooting at the Washington Hilton hotel during the White House correspondents' dinner, where U.S. President Donald Trump and other senior officials were gathered with reporters. 

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Trump told 60 Minutes he wants to do the White House correspondents' dinner again within a month, saying he doesn't want a "crazy person" to be able to cancel the event. 

Saturday was his first time attending the annual dinner as president, after he broke with a long-standing presidential tradition by avoiding it his entire first term. 

"I hope we're going to do it again," he told O'Donnell. "Norah, tell 'em to get it going, and we should do it within 30 days, and they'll have even more security, and they'll have bigger perimeter security. It'll be fine."

Trump levelled some of his usual criticisms at the "liberal" media during the interview, but also said that during the commotion on Saturday he "saw a room that was just totally unified. It was, in one way, very beautiful." 

Trump told 60 Minutes that the suspect's speed, captured on security cameras as he ran through metal detectors at the hotel, was "incredible."

He commended law enforcement for taking him down, and said he didn't fault them for the suspect getting as far as he did before they apprehended him. 

"I think the NFL should sign him up. He was fast. When you look at it on tape, it's almost like a blur," Trump said. 

Trump calls U.S. Presidency a ‘dangerous profession’

U.S. President Donald Trump held a news conference after he was escorted offstage at the White House correspondents' dinner Saturday night when gunshots rang out in the lobby.

When asked whether there's something he can do to change the trajectory of political violence in the U.S., Trump brushed off the notion that violence has gotten worse, but said "hate speech" from Democrats is "very dangerous." 

"Well, you know, you go back 20 years, 40 years, 100 years, 200 years, 500 years, it's always been there. People are assassinated. People are injured. People are hurt," he told 60 Minutes. "And I'm not sure that it's any more now than there was."

O'Donnell says it took 10 seconds for security to flank Trump and 20 seconds to get him out when news broke of an active shooter. 

Trump says he "probably made them act a little bit more slowly" because he wanted to see what was going on. 

"It was a little bit me. I wanted to see what was happening, and I wasn't making it that easy for them," he said. 

Trump said he initially told security, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Lemme see. Wait a minute," but said he complied when they told him to go down on the floor. 

Trump said in his 60 Minutes interview on CBS that he wasn't worrying during the commotion in the ballroom that there would be injuries.

"I wasn't worried. I understand life. We live in a crazy world," he said.

In an interview that aired Sunday evening, Trump berated 60 Minutes reporter Norah O’Donnell when she asked for his reaction to a section of Allen's so-called manifesto, where the suspect allegedly wrote, "I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes." 

Trump responded, "I was waiting for you to read that, because I knew you would, because you're horrible people." 

Trump said he is not a rapist or a pedophile. 

He said he's read the manifesto and called the suspect a "sick person." 

"You're a disgrace," he said to O'Donnell, but he agreed to continue the interview.

U.S. Law enforcement are reassessing Trump's security arrangements. 

Two former Secret Service agents and three senior U.S. Officials told Reuters that Saturday's event underscored some vulnerabilities, even after two assassination attempts against Trump in 2024 prompted stronger security measures. 

The officials said security personnel ​may need to expand the protective perimeter around the president at large public venues, even if that leads to public inconvenience.

Bill Gage, who served on the Secret Service's Counter Assault Team for six years and is now executive protection director for the SafeHaven Security Group, said the Secret Service "is going to have to find a way to better secure ⁠large hotels that may inconvenience the hotelgoers and the hotel."

Some officials noted the security perimeter at Trump's rallies is often much more expansive than the one established on Saturday.

Don Mihalek, a former senior Secret Service agent who has worked previous correspondents' dinners at the Washington Hilton, said securing the sprawling site has long posed challenges.

Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche told ABC News's This Week with George Stephanopoulos that Allen will be formally charged in federal court on Monday with assault of a federal officer and use of a firearm during a crime of violence. 

Forty-five years ago, a U.S. President was shot outside the same hotel where Saturday's White House Correspondents’ Association dinner took place.

Ronald Reagan was hit in the chest by a ricocheting bullet fired by John Hinckley Jr. On March 30, 1981, while he was walking to his limousine after giving a speech at the Washington Hilton hotel.

Three others were wounded in the shooting that sent Reagan to hospital for 12 days with a punctured lung and a broken rib.

Hinckley attacked Reagan in a bid to impress actress Jodie Foster, whom he had developed an obsession with. He was found not guilty by reason of insanity on charges of attempting to assassinate the president. 

Hinckley was held in a psychiatric facility until his release in 2016. 

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