Trump was barely out of the Washington Hilton before he turned a gunman scare into a $400 million sales pitch

President Donald Trump and his allies are using a scary incident at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner to push for a $400 million White House ballroom. A gunman ran through a security checkpoint at the Washington Hilton during the event on Saturday night, leading to Trump and other senior government officials being quickly evacuated from the hotel ballroom.

The suspect, Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, was arrested and charged with attempted assassination of a federal official. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said on NBC News‘ Meet the Press that early findings show the suspect was targeting Trump administration officials. Trump’s appearance at the dinner was his first as president, as he had skipped the event in previous years.

Trump is now using the incident to argue that a secure ballroom on White House grounds is necessary. In an interview with Fox News, Trump said that the 90,000-square-foot ballroom he is building is “really what you need” to keep the president and government officials safe. The ballroom is currently under construction where the East Wing once stood.

Critics say the $400 million White House ballroom argument is a cynical use of a security scare

A federal judge has repeatedly blocked the ballroom’s construction, ruling that Trump went beyond his authority by moving ahead without congressional approval. However, following Saturday’s incident, the Justice Department sent a letter to the plaintiffs in the case, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, asking them to drop their lawsuit.

“The White House ballroom will ensure the safety and security of the president for decades to come and prevent future assassination attempts on the president at the Washington Hilton,” wrote Brett Shumate, assistant attorney general in the civil division. Shumate also said the ballroom would mean the president would no longer need to leave the White House to attend large gatherings.

Senator Lindsey Graham said he will introduce a bill on Monday to authorize the ballroom and provide funding for it. “Any time we’re having events that are not at the Capitol or at the White House, we should think about line of succession problems,” Graham said, adding that the incident could have been far worse.

After Trump, the next in line for the presidency are Vice President JD Vance and House Speaker Mike Johnson. Trump has been making several headline-grabbing moves lately, including backing a plan to rename ICE to NICE to improve the image of immigration agents.

Not everyone is buying the argument. Ned Price, a State Department spokesman under former President Joe Biden, said the whole situation “seems a manufactured argument that is cynically taking advantage of this moment to make that case.” 

Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group that sued for the release of the ballroom funding agreement, was equally critical. “The argument is an absurdity. No one would expect the president to be locked in a bunker for all events,” she said.

The ballroom would hold about 1,000 people, which is far fewer than the 3,000 that the Washington Hilton can hold, raising questions about whether it could even serve as a real alternative for events like the WHCA dinner. 

This is not the first time Trump has tried to use a security incident to support the ballroom project. In 2024, Trump survived two attempts on his life, after which he began pushing for a ballroom “designed in conjunction with the military and in conjunction with the Secret Service,” with “every single bell and whistle you can possibly have for security and safety.”

The safety concerns around presidential travel are real. Four U.S. presidents have been killed while in office, and the more a president travels, the greater the risk. White House aides have said Trump needs an active campaign schedule if Republicans are to keep control of Congress in the November midterm elections, meaning he cannot simply stay within the White House. 

Trump’s spending decisions have also drawn scrutiny elsewhere, such as his move to spend $1.5 million fixing a water issue that critics say Barack Obama had already resolved. However, critics argue that a $400 million ballroom is not the right answer to this challenge, and that the Trump administration is using a frightening moment to push through a project that has already been blocked by the courts.