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Security around Trump has ‘tightened’ since Pennsylvania assassination attempt: House Republican

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by Max Rego - 04/26/26 3:13 PM ET

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by Max Rego - 04/26/26 3:13 PM ET

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Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) said Sunday that security has “tightened” around President Trump since his July 2024 assassination attempt, after a gunman exchanged shots with law enforcement at Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.

“It improved since Pennsylvania. The policy is when the president is shot at or in threat, you get him down, you get him out, you wrap him with a ballistic blanket, and you get him out of there,” Zinke, a former Interior secretary during Trump’s first administration, told host Chris Stirewalt on NewsNation’s “The Hill Sunday.”

The retired Navy SEAL noted that after the president was shot in the ear at a rally in Butler, Pa., Trump was able to rise up off the ground and raise his right fist in the air.

“That basically should have never happened because he should have been far, far away,” Zinke said of the image. “So I think the security has improved. But we’re vulnerable.”

Just more than two months after that incident in Pennsylvania, a man pointed a gun at Trump while the president played golf at his club in West Palm Beach, Fla. The man, 60-year-old Ryan Routh, did not fire a shot, as a Secret Service agent fired multiple rounds at him.

Saturday’s incident occurred when an armed man charged a security checkpoint outside the ballroom at the Washington Hilton, the same hotel that former President Reagan and three others were shot outside of in 1981.

Interim Metropolitan Police Department Chief Jeffery Carroll told reporters Saturday that the man, whom multiple outlets identified as 31-year-old Cole Allen of Torrance, Calif., was armed with a shotgun, a handgun and multiple knives.

CBS News reported Sunday, citing law enforcement and White House officials, that the suspect wrote a manifesto in which he said he wanted to target Trump administration officials “prioritized from highest-ranking to lowest.” A White House official confirmed to The Hill that the suspect wrote such a manifesto.

After shots were fired, Secret Service agents whisked Trump, first lady Melania Trump, Vice President Vance and other administration officials off the stage in the ballroom. President Trump also credited Secret Service and law enforcement for their work on Saturday, writing on his Truth Social platform that they “did a fantastic job” and “acted quickly and bravely.”

U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro told reporters Saturday that the suspect will be arraigned in federal court Monday on two charges — using a firearm during a crime of violence and assault on a federal officer using a dangerous weapon.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said earlier Sunday that the man could “absolutely” be charged with attempting to assassinate Trump.

“The way that these charges work, a lot of the charges that he could be charged with depends on us understanding his motive, his premeditation, what he wanted to do,” Blanche told host Dana Bash on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“And that requires us to go through the evidence and develop a case, which the FBI is working on now.”

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