Cole Allen charged with attempted assassination of Trump

Cole Thomas Allen Torrance, California, appeared Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to face federal charges stemming from Saturday night’s armed attack on a security checkpoint during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

Judge Matthew Sharbaugh ordered Allen held pending a detention hearing on Thursday. The suspect, who appeared on the basis of a criminal complaint rather than an indictment, was not required to enter a plea. He faces three federal charges: attempted assassination of the president, transporting a firearm in interstate commerce, and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence.

Allen, 31, a Caltech-trained mechanical engineer who recently earned a master’s degree in computer science from California State University, Dominguez Hills, taught part-time at a Torrance test preparation company and built indie video games on the side, according to a WIRED review of public databases, which revealed a minimal online presence.

The Metropolitan Police Department claims the suspect approached a Secret Service checkpoint at the Hilton Hotel on Saturday night armed with a rifle, a handgun and several knives. Agents intercepted the suspect before he could reach the hall, where President Donald Trump was preparing to speak.

Witnesses reported hearing several shots outside the room, and agents quickly escorted Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance off the stage. One agent was injured but was protected by his bulletproof vest. Trump later told reporters that the agent was not injured.

Interim Chief of Police Geoffrey Carroll described the suspect as a “lone actor” and said he was taken to hospital for evaluation after his arrest.

Nearly 10 minutes before the shooting, the suspect allegedly emailed his family a “statement,” according to the New York Post, which cited U.S. officials and a copy of the document. In it, the author says they are “no longer willing to allow a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to stain my hands with his crimes” — language that the Washington Post read as a reference to Trump.

The writer reportedly said he planned to use buckshot instead of slugs to “minimize casualties” but would “go past most of the people here to get to the targets if it was absolutely necessary,” arguing that guests who chose to attend were “complicit.” The document also mocks Hilton hotel security: “I walk into the Hilton hotel carrying multiple weapons and not a single person there is thinking that I might pose a threat.”

Within hours of the attack, Trump and a group of administration officials, GOP lawmakers and right-wing influencers seized on the gunfire to demand that construction continue unimpeded on the $400 million, 90,000-square-foot White House ballroom that Trump is building on the demolished East Wing, a project mired in lawsuits from the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which it says has bypassed Congress.

“This event would never have happened with the Top Secret Military Ballroom currently being built at the White House,” Trump said in a tweet on Truth Social on Sunday morning.

The White House Correspondents’ Association, which is hosting the dinner, is not an affiliate of the White House but rather an independent, nonprofit organization for journalists who cover the administration, and there is no indication it would agree to hold the event, described as a celebration of press freedom, inside the executive mansion.