Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the suspected gunman who opened fire outside of the White House correspondents’ dinner Saturday night appears to have been targeting administration officials, “likely including the president.”
“We’re still looking into that,” Blanche said on NBC News’ Meet the Press Sunday, while cautioning that the investigation is still in its preliminary stages. “We know that there were some writings, and we’ve already spoken with several witnesses who knew him.”
As far as the exact threats that may have been communicated beforehand, “we’re still actively investigating that evidence,” Blanche told NBC anchor Kristen Welker.
“We do believe it was administration officials,” Blanche said. “Obviously, President Trump is a member of the administration, the head of it.”
The suspect “barely broke the perimeter” of the event.
“And by barely, I mean by a few feet,” Blanche said on NBC.
U.S. Secret Service Director Matthew Quinn made a similar remark on X Sunday.
The suspect, whose name has not yet been publicly released by officials, “underestimated the protective capabilities of the U.S. Secret Service, and was stopped at first contact,” Quinn wrote.
“The strength of our layered security posture was evident, with a myriad of countermeasures still ahead,” Quinn said.
Law enforcement currently believes that the suspect traveled from Los Angeles, California, then to Chicago, Illinois, before getting to Washington D.C. From there, he checked into the Washington Hilton where the dinner was taking place.
That suspect is now in custody. While he was taken to the hospital for evaluation, he was not struck by gunfire, interim Washington, D.C., police chief Jeffery Carroll said on Saturday night.
No guests, including Trump and other officials, were injured. One officer was shot, Trump said at a press briefing, but saved by the fact that he was wearing a bulletproof vest.
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