President Donald Trump had seemingly just arrived — and the military color guard could not have been out of the room for more than a few minutes — when what sounded like five shots rang out from just behind the door closest to the table that my two colleagues and I had been assigned to for Saturday night’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
“Pop-pop-pop-pop-pop,” the jarring sounds rang out in rapid succession.
People told me they thought a server had dropped a tray behind closed doors. For some reason, I knew better.
I don’t know why I recognized the sound as gunshots, but I did.
Not that I needed confirmation to believe my ears, but as I turned to look in the direction where the rapid-fire sounds had come from, I saw something I had never seen in 10 years of covering the President of the United States: Secret Service agents, rushing through the room with their service weapons drawn.
Plainclothes protective agents are a near-constant presence for anyone who spends time covering the president or other top officials. They always have some sort of lapel pin identifying them. Their suit jackets are cut generously to hide the holster and extra magazines on their belts. They stand around with their hands usually holding each other in a “ready” position — never in their pockets.
But in the decade since I started on the White House beat, I never saw any of them such much as reach for their weapons. Let alone unholster them. Until now.
As people began screaming and pulling at each other’s clothes while urging them to “GET DOWN, GET DOWN!” under the table, security personnel began slamming the doors to Washington’s largest ballroom.
More noise from behind the door to the Hilton Hotel ballroom, then silence.
Maybe it was because my table was behind me when I looked at the door. Maybe I was just too stubborn to heed warnings to get under the table. But my brain didn’t process protecting myself at that point.
I remained sitting, turning my head to the right to see Trump and others at the dais being hustled out of the room.
Then, as people remained sheltered, I saw a line of uniformed and other law enforcement, guns drawn, make their way from a side door into the center of the room.
Quickly, dignitaries including most of the president’s cabinet were ushered out under guard.
Kash Patel, the FBI director, had been seated at a table nearby with reporters and editors from the Daily Mail. I had arrived at the dinner at the same time Patel did and watched just a single agent trail him as he’d made his way to his table.
He and others, including a group that counted Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth among it’s numbers paused at the back of the ballroom as if they were unsure of where to go.
Eventually, they left under armed escort.
The doors slammed.
For the next hour, the room of nearly 1,000 reporters, saddled with terrible wifi and hardly any mobile service tried to do what we all do on a daily basis. Report.
It was hard without much new information, though some people managed to get through to sources.
Eventually, we were told “protocol” required that the dinner be canceled. Trump and the reporters who’d been trailing him as the protective “pool” returned to the White House, where he prepared to give a press conference.
We were told Trump wanted to return and continue the dinner event and awards ceremony. Security concerns rightfully overruled that desire and he promised a return for the event “in the next 30 days.”
As Trump frequently says, “we’ll see what happens.”
