Security Scrutiny Follows Shooting Incident at White House Correspondents' Dinner

President Donald Trump told reporters, "I can't imagine that there's any profession that is more dangerous," just hours after he was at the centre of another major security incident.

While a small army of Secret Service agents make the president arguably the world's most protected person, keeping him safe is proving to be no easy task.

There was the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, in the summer of 2024 in which a bullet grazed his ear. Just 64 days later, Trump was again the target of a would-be assassin as he played a round on his Florida golf course.

Now, hours after gunshots shattered the revelry of the White House Correspondents' Association dinner at the Hilton hotel in the nation's capital, Trump's security is once again under scrutiny.

While the motive and precise target of the suspected shooter, 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen, remain unclear, questions are mounting over how a gunman could get so close to the president. Among them is the level of screening at the hotel hosting some of Washington's most high-profile politicians, diplomats and journalists.

Gary O'Donoghue, the BBC's Chief North America correspondent who was at the dinner, said while roads were closed around the Washington Hilton for hours, security at the venue itself "wasn't particularly heavy". "The man on the door outside only took a cursory look at my ticket from what must have been six feet away," he wrote.

CCTV posted on social media by Trump shows the suspect charge through a Secret Service checkpoint which was located on the floor above the ballroom. Authorities have said he was in possession of a shotgun, handgun and multiple knives. CNN's Wolf Blitzer told the network he saw the suspect shoot several times using a "very very serious" weapon.

The president later posted a photo of a shirtless man on the floor with his hands cuffed behind his back with Secret Service officers standing around him. Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche told NBC News it appeared as though he was targeting administration officials, "likely including the president".

Police have said Cole Tomas Allen was a guest at the Washington Hilton, which continued to operate as a hotel despite having some of the most powerful people in the world in the same building. "If you were there [as a hotel guest] and you had bad intentions about breaking into this dinner, there's just one security thing you had to get past... and then you're in the ballroom," he told the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

Trump himself later said the Hilton was "not a particularly secure building", adding that incident showed the importance of the new White House ballroom that is under construction but subject to litigation. "It's actually a larger room, and it's a much more secure. It's drone proof. It's bullet-proof glass. We need the ballroom," he said.

The president also praised the "bravery" of the Secret Service, who took him and Vice-President JD Vance off the stage, saying they did "a great job". Experts in law enforcement and presidential security have said the fact the gunman never made it into the ballroom itself suggested that the security arrangements worked.

Former FBI special agent Jeff Kroeger told the BBC: "This is exactly what the Secret Service is trained do to." When gunshots were heard they "converged on the president", creating a "body barrier", he said. Former Secret Service agent Barry Donadio also told the BBC there appeared to be "no lack of agents, officers and police" at the event.

Commenting on how security might change, some experts said they expected some stronger measures for Trump events now, such as a wider perimeter.

The killing of Charlie Kirk in Utah last year further exposed America's bitter political divisions. The conservative commentator was shot while speaking at a Turning Point USA event in an act of violence that was filmed and spread across the internet. And in 2022, former House speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband Paul was attacked with a hammer and hospitalised with a fractured skull. In 2017, Republican Steve Scalise and four other people were shot and wounded while lawmakers were practising for a congressional baseball game in Virginia.

"They're big names, and I hate to say I'm honoured by that, but I've done a lot [for the US]."