Cole Tomas Allen, the man arrested after allegedly charging a security checkpoint for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, was criminally charged Monday with trying to assassinate President Donald Trump, who was in attendance at that event Saturday.
Allen, 31, is also charged with transportation of a firearm or ammunition in interstate commerce, and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence, a prosecutor said at his arraignment in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.
“He attempted to assassinate the president of the United States, Donald J. Trump … an enumerated crime of terrorism,” the prosecutor said as she asked Magistrate Judge Matthew Sharbaugh to order Allen detained without bond.
In a sworn affidavit submitted in support of the charges, an FBI special agent said Allen had reserved a room at the Washington Hilton Hotel on April 6, nearly three weeks before the dinner was hosted there. Trump had announced on March 2 his plan to attend the event.
Allen, of Torrance, Calif., traveled by train from his home state over several days, arriving in Washington on Friday afternoon.
As the event was underway in the hotel’s ballroom, Allen “approached and ran through the magnetometer holding a long gun,” the agent wrote.
“As he did so, U.S. Secret Service personnel assigned to the checkpoint heard a loud gunshot. U.S. Secret Service Officer V.G. was shot once in the chest; Officer V.G. was wearing a ballistic vest at the time.”
That officer fired his service weapon at Allen, “who fell to the ground and suffered minor injuries but was not shot,” the affidavit stated.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said at a press conference later Monday afternoon that the officer fired his weapon five times.
Allen had a 12-gauge pump action shotgun and a Rock Island Armory 1911 .38 caliber pistol on his person when he was arrested, according to the affidavit.
The prosecutor said in court that Allen was also carrying three knives and other dangerous paraphernalia when he was arrested.
FBI agents gather information from neighbors of Cole Thomas Allen, the suspected gunman at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Torrance, California, on April 26, 2026.
Grace Hie Yoon | Anadolu | Getty Images
Sharbaugh scheduled a detention hearing for Thursday morning after Allen’s attorney, Tezira Abe, said he agreed with prosecutors to hold the proceeding that day. The judge also scheduled a preliminary hearing in the case for Monday.
The court hearing came as concerns have been raised over the Secret Service’s handling of Saturday’s event, where Trump and Vice President JD Vance were evacuated after gunshots rang out within hearing of the ballroom at the Washington Hilton Hotel.
“We got to do a couple of things differently, and we’re already talking about it, and that’s the good thing, and we’re going to be better postured for the next event,” FBI Director Kash Patel told “Fox and Friends” in an interview on Monday morning.
“Just to remind everyone. This was almost the entirety of the president’s cabinet, the president and vice president himself, and 2,000 members of the media,” Patel said. “This is something the movies don’t even write about, this kind of tragedy.”
Patel said the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit is involved in the investigation and that it has collected emails, social media postings, and conducted interviews to get insight into Allen’s motivation.
At roughly the same time as the shooting, Allen emailed his family and a former employer “explaining the actions he was about to take,” the FBI affidavit said.
“I wish I could have said anything earlier, but doing so would have made none of this possible. My sincerest apologies for all the trouble I’ve caused,” read the email, titled “Apology and Explanation.”
“On to why I did any of this: I am a citizen of the United States of America. What my representatives do reflects on me. And I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes,” Allen wrote in the email, according to the affidavit.
Trump administration officials “are targets, prioritized from highest-ranking to lowest,” he allegedly wrote, explicitly excluding Patel.
Secret Service agents are targets “only if necessary,” and hotel security, Capitol Police officers and National Guard members are “not targets if at all possible (aka unless they shoot at me),” the email read, per the affidavit.
In a “P.S.” in the note, which was first reported by The New York Post but is not included in the affidavit, Allen went on what he called a “rant” about the apparent lack of security measures at the Hilton.
“I walk in with multiple weapons and not a single person there considers the possibility that I could be a threat,” Allen wrote, according to The Post. The security at the event is all outside, focused on protestors and current arrivals, because apparently no one thought about what happens if someone checks in the day before.”
“Like, this level of incompetence is insane, and I very sincerely hope it’s corrected by the time this country gets actually competent leadership again,” he wrote.
The letter was signed “Cole ‘coldForce’ ‘Friendly Federal Assassin’ Allen,” The Post reported.
