Sen Fetterman urges lower political temperature after WHCA shooting
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Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., said America needs to cool its heated political discourse following the shooting at Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner.
“We really need to lower that temperature,” he told “Hannity” on Monday. “The president was also shot in the head in my state, in Butler. People seem to have forgotten that, too.”
“We were really lucky because it could have been a much bigger disaster and I’m very grateful that no one was injured.”
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President Donald Trump speaks at a press conference in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on April 25, 2026, after the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner was canceled following a possible shooting. (Getty Images)
The suspected shooter at the WHCA Dinner, computer scientist Cole Allen of Torrance, California, allegedly wrote in a manifesto note that his targets were Trump administration officials other than FBI Director Kash Patel. Allen donated $25 to Kamala Harris during the 2024 election cycle, according to Federal Election Commission records. He faces three charges, including attempting to assassinate the President of the United States, carrying a firearm across state lines and using a firearm during a crime of violence.
Fetterman’s comments about political rhetoric come as comedian Jimmy Kimmel faces backlash after jokingly calling First Lady Melania Trump a “widow in waiting” days before the WHCA Dinner attack.
“Our First Lady, Melania, is here. Look at Melania, she is beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you shine like a pregnant widow,” Kimmel said on Thursday.
Melania Trump condemned his ill-timed joke in a statement on Monday morning.
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“His monologue about my family is not comedy; his words are corrosive and deepen the political sickness in America,” he said.
President Donald Trump fired back, saying ABC should fire Kimmel “immediately” for his “despicable call to violence.”
Fetterman criticized the heated political rhetoric that the White House said has incited violent attacks like Saturday’s shooting.
Melania Trump slammed Jimmy Kimmel after he jokingly called her a “widow in waiting.” (Getty Images)
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“I have always refused to use this type of language, and I strongly and most strongly reject extreme rhetoric at this point,” the Pennsylvania Democrat said.
Since the shooting, Trump has reignited calls for a ballroom to be built at the White House to create a safe space for official events.
Fetterman said the event, held at the Washington Hilton, was inappropriately safe, especially since the presidential row was also there.
He told “Hannity” that he fully supports building a ballroom at the White House and called on his Democratic colleagues to “drop TDS and help build it.”
President Donald Trump gives a presentation of the planned $400 million White House Ballroom expansion during a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in the Oval Office in Washington, DC, on October 22, 2025. (Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg)
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“We “We need a secure facility for events like this,” Fetterman said. “We could never allow ourselves to be attacked like that. That hotel was never designed to do that safely.”
“Our country deserves this. This will create an environment that is safer, more inclusive and truly more accessible to people,” he added.
