Washington in shock after White House press dinner shooting: ‘an angry, polarized nation’ | White House correspondents’ dinner shooting

Stunned by Sunday’s shooting at a prestigious media gala attended by Donald Trump and senior White House officials, Washington faced questions about political violence and gun control.

A man targeted a Secret Service agent at a security checkpoint at the Washington Hilton hotel the night before and was subsequently caught and arrested. Trump and Melania Trump were rushed from the annual White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) dinner as guests tried to hide under tables.

The chaotic events raised new questions about the safety of senior officials, many of whom had gathered in the hotel’s vast ballroom. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said: said NBC’s Meet the Press: “It looks like he actually decided to target people who work in the administration, including the president.”

The brazen attack on the Hilton (the hotel where then-president Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981) also occurred against a backdrop of increasing political violence and an epidemic of gun violence in the United States.

Trump himself has often been criticized for stepping up on vitriolic and incendiary rhetoric. Over the past 10 years, he has called on crowds to “take out the nonsense” of protesters, urged his supporters to “fight like hell” after his 2020 election defeat, and mused that policing could be ended “on one really violent day.”extraordinarily rude” Without fear of revenge.

Speaking in the White House briefing room on Saturday, still wearing his black tie attire, the president called the gunman a “very sick person” and a “lone wolf, crazy business” and added: “These are crazy people and they need to be taken care of.”

Pressed by a reporter about whether political violence has become the cost of doing business in modern America, the president said with an air of resignation: “This is a dangerous profession.”

But such an idea sparked a new soul-searching in Washington’s political class. Lanhee Chen is a member of the Hoover Institution think tank in Stanford, California. Meet the Press said: “Political violence seems to have become part of doing business, but it shouldn’t be normal. It shouldn’t be normalized, and that’s something that shouldn’t be overlooked. And ultimately it’s up to public leaders to set the right tone.”

“I thought the president did that at the press conference last night. I think it’s important for others to do the same. But ultimately we shouldn’t be saying, ‘Hey, we’re used to this. This is America. It’s happened before.’ Someone has to draw the line. And we’ve seen that many times now.”

Over the past decade, the United States has been rocked by the shooting at a congressional baseball practice, the deadly white supremacist march in Charlottesville, the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, two assassination attempts on Trump, and the murders of former Minnesota House speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband and right-wing activist Charlie Kirk. Threats against members of Congress are at record levels due to the hiring of some private security guards.

Democratic congressman Jamie Raskin, who on Sunday found himself protecting Kerry Kennedy, whose father and uncle were victims of historic assassinations, decried the normalization of violence and linked the latest incident to the broader epidemic of mass shootings in schools and communities.

raskin He told CNN’s State of the Union: “We haven’t solved the problem, and we lose thousands of people to gun violence every year. 100 people are shot every day. So when that nightmare was happening at the White House Correspondents’ Ball yesterday, dozens of people were shot across the country.

“And we accept that as the normal course of business. So before we go back to all the political divisions and fighting on some issues, maybe this could be a moment of unity to try to focus on the things that the vast majority of the American people want, like universal violent criminal background checks.”

There are more guns and phones in America than people. Trump administration faced Criticisms of eliminating bipartisan gun safety and mental health investments.

Republican senator Thom Tillis told Meet the Press: “Social media’s amplification and instigation can target really vulnerable people. In many cases, we see that the people who commit these horrific acts face behavioral health and other challenges (stability issues in their lives). And now we have platforms that can focus on them as state actors and terrorist organizations that are inciting hatred in this country.”

The suspect, identified by law enforcement as 31-year-old Cole Allen of Torrance, California, attacked a security checkpoint located on the lobby level, one floor above the main ballroom, before being subdued. He was carrying a shotgun, a pistol and several knives. A uniformed Secret Service officer fired a bullet into his chest, his life saved only by his ballistic vest.

The suspect will be charged in federal court Monday with assault on a federal officer, discharge of a firearm and attempted murder of a federal officer. The focus of the investigation will likely be on how he smuggled the shotgun into the hotel.

Meanwhile, the British Embassy in Washington, which is preparing for King Charles’s visit to Washington starting from Monday, said in a statement that discussions are continuing on whether the incident will affect the visit planning.

John Cohen, former acting undersecretary of intelligence for the Department of Homeland Security. He told ABC’s This Week: “This is the most volatile, complex and dangerous threat environment I have experienced in my more than 42 years of involvement in law enforcement and homeland security.

“We are an angry, polarized nation. We have a growing number of people, especially young men, who believe that violence is the only way to express their grievances or opposition to the current political conditions in this country. They are increasingly informed and inspired by the content they consume online, placed there by terrorist groups, foreign intelligence services and others for the express purpose of inciting and inciting violence.”