Federal law enforcement officials in the United States are evaluating how to handle some high-profile public events involving President Donald Trump, following the attack that occurred at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner last Saturday.
This is the third time in less than two years that a gunman has come alarmingly close to Trump, renewing fundamental concerns about how to meet the Office of the President’s public-facing requirements while minimizing the risk of an attack.
Saturday’s incident, in which a man armed with guns and knives attempted to storm the hall of the Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C., where the president was scheduled to deliver a speech to the White House Correspondents’ Association, came before Trump’s expected participation in a series of large and prominent events, internal and external, during the coming months.
Among these activities are celebrating the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, supervising the United States’ hosting of the World Cup, and leading rallies aimed at mobilizing support for Republicans before the midterm elections next November.
According to a senior US presidential official, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles will hold a meeting this week with officials from the White House Operations Team, the Secret Service, and the Department of Homeland Security to discuss security protocol at events attended by the president.
The official, who requested to remain anonymous to ensure the confidentiality of the discussions, said that the meeting will discuss the security measures that succeeded last Saturday, in addition to “exploring additional options” for future events.
An informed source reported that the US Secret Service is re-evaluating its security preparations for the upcoming events. The agency’s security alert level has already been raised due to the huge number of threats facing Trump, including two successive assassination attempts in 2024, as well as the repercussions of recent events such as the US-Iran war.
Security plans
On Saturday evening, Trump spoke from the White House about the presidency, saying, “I do not imagine there is a profession more dangerous than this.”
Within the Secret Service, agents from the intelligence, protection, and threat assessment teams are re-examining the threats directed at Trump in recent months.
According to the same source, high-profile attacks may be followed by similar acts of violence.
In this context, the White House and Buckingham Palace confirmed that the official visit of King Charles of Britain and his wife Camilla on Monday will take place as planned.
However, organizing major events that will be held in the future, including the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) bout on the White House lawn to celebrate Trump’s 80th birthday next June, World Cup matches, and the IndyCar race that will pass in front of the White House, may become more complicated.
Latent tension
Lawmakers, event attendees and some of the president’s allies see a flaw in the security plan for the Correspondents’ Dinner, questioning why someone like the shooter was able to reserve a hotel room to smuggle weapons bypassing the outer security line.
Republican Representative from Texas, Michael McCaul, said that security protocols for Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance may need to be modified.
McCaul believes the Secret Service “needs to reconsider having the president and vice president together at such an event.”
Carrie Lake, the former Republican candidate for governor of Arizona, who was chosen by Trump to head the US Global Information Agency, complained that she was not required to show a photo ID to match her ticket to the Correspondents’ Dinner at the hotel. “I can’t believe how lax security measures are,” she wrote on X.
It is noteworthy that the Secret Service is only responsible for the safety of the individuals it protects, and not for the safety of the event itself, and the agency was immediately celebrated for its response, and received high-level support from Trump himself.
“Our multi-level protection system is effective,” the agency’s director, Sean Curran, said on Saturday.
As for Garrett Graf, author of “The Story of the US Government’s Secret Plan to Save Itself — While the Rest of Us Die,” he wrote in his analysis of the multiple layers of security surrounding Trump during the dinner, “The system appears to be working as designed, with the trade-offs always necessary for security in a free society.”
Antagonists and barriers
Ronald Kessler, author of the book “In the President’s Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents Who Protect Them,” suggests that authorities will consider placing bulletproof glass around the place where Trump delivers his speeches, both indoors and outdoors, similar to what happened after the attempt on his life in Butler, Pennsylvania, during the height of the 2024 presidential campaign.
Kessler added that attendees will likely be subject to more thorough searches in the future, which will increase congestion at entrances that could take hours to clear.
An example of what might happen is what happened last fall, when Trump attended the US Open men’s tennis final, which led to the formation of huge security lines.
These events underscore the complexity of security issues related to protecting the president in a country where citizens expect their leaders to move around in public places, hold rallies, attend events, and appear before audiences.
Conflicting relationships
According to the White House Historical Association, the Secret Service assumed full responsibility for protecting the president during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, who took office after the assassination of William McKinley in 1901.
However, Roosevelt found the constant security presence exhausting, and he would sometimes sneak out to go on picnics or horseback rides in Rock Creek Park in Washington.
Kessler said that security personnel wanted President Ronald Reagan to exit the Washington Hilton Hotel building, where the shooting occurred on Saturday night, through a covered garage in 1981, but Reagan’s team was concerned that the scene would be bad, so the president was shot while leaving an uncovered exit, and he ultimately survived.
After the shooting last Saturday, Secret Service agents surrounded Trump, who appeared to slip slightly as he was led away. Another team moved his deputy, Vance, so quickly that it seemed as if it would drag him out of the room while he was still sitting on the banquet chair.
“I wanted to see what was going on,” Trump said Sunday. “And by then, we were starting to realize that maybe it was a serious problem — a different kind of problem — a serious problem.”
He added: “Maybe I made them act more slowly. I said: ‘Wait a minute, wait a minute. Let me see. Wait a minute.'” He said he started to get out but they said, “Please get down, get down on the floor, please,” so I got down, and the First Lady got down, too.
It is noteworthy that Trump repeatedly praised the Secret Service and his bodyguards, and pressured the Correspondents Association to reschedule the dinner. He said he would have more stringent security measuresThere will be more perimeter security, “and everything will be fine.”
