The shooting at White House correspondents’ dinner on Saturday not only put President Donald Trump at risk but many top administration officials in the line of succession were there too.
Considering all the VIPs, many attendees at the gathering said security was relatively lax, though law enforcement officials maintained protocols worked as they were supposed to and pointed out the alleged gunman was stopped outside the ballroom where Trump and top officials were seated.
Below the president, there are 18 officials in the line of succession, starting with the vice president and ending with the secretary of homeland security. According to one tally, at least 12 of them were at the correspondents’ dinner.
They include Vice President JD Vance, House Speaker Mike Johnson, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, among others.
To be sure, such a collection of senior officials in one place is not new in Washington, D.C., with the State of the Union address and presidential inaugurations being notable examples. But those events take place at the Capitol, while the correspondents’ dinner was at the Washington Hilton.
Long popular with federal leadership, the hotel added security features after the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981, but it’s still a place where guests stay. The suspect, Cole Tomas Allen, checked in there a day before the shooting, armed with a shotgun, pistols, and knives—with the intention to target Trump and top administration officials.
During an interview Sunday on ABC News’ This Week, Blanche was asked about the fact that the president and so many members of the line of succession were at the dinner.
“The system worked,” he replied. “Law enforcement and the Secret Service protected all of us. The man barely got past the perimeter. And so when you have a perimeter designed to keep people safe, like President Trump, and it works, that’s something that should be applauded.”
Blanche added that Trump will not stop going out and communicating with the public because of the shooting and that the presence of top leadership in the same location is why such events have so much security.
He later reiterated that the system worked. “The Secret Service kept us safe, and that man was quickly apprehended and subdued seconds after he tried to breach the perimeter.”
The hotel was closed to the public beginning at 2 p.m. Saturday in anticipation of the dinner which began at 8 p.m. Access to the building was limited to hotel guests, people with tickets to the dinner, an invitation to related receptions, or documents from the White House Correspondents’ Association, according to the Associated Press.
Once the president was in the ballroom, additional attendees were not permitted to enter the secured area. Inside the ballroom, the Secret Service established another perimeter around the president. Armored plates were also placed under Trump’s table, while Secret Service agents were posted at the front of the stage and to the sides, along with counter-assault agents. Top officials also had their own security details with them in the ballroom too.
Still in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, questions were raised about the level of security at the hotel. While some reporters who had attended the dinner in prior years said security had not changed, other attendees were troubled.
“I was there this evening and there was no security to be admitted to the lobby of the hotel. Guests had to simply flash a ticket to a pre-event party or the dinner itself to be let into the premises, which in hindsight was alarming,” Caty Payette, communications director for Sen. Martin Heinrich, posted on X.
Symone Sanders-Townsend, an MS NOW host and former advisor to Vice President Kamala Harris, told the network that she went past the hotel perimeter, entered the building, and reached the red carpet area all without ever showing anyone her ID or a ticket to the dinner.
“What happened tonight in terms of protocol—from what I know, having experienced it myself—was not protocol,” she said.
At a news conference Saturday night, Secret Service Director Sean Curren said the gunman charged a checkpoint and was apprehended, showing that “our multi-layered protection works.”
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro, who attended the differ, also endorsed the security measures during the briefing.
“This individual was intent on doing as much harm and as much damage as he could and thankfully because of the checkpoint—right outside the ballroom where thousands of people were situated to hear the president of the United States—because that checkpoint worked there was no one who was injured,” she said.
