President Donald Trump explained to “The Sunday Briefing” co-host Jacqui Heinrich why the Secret Service insisted he return to the White House after a gunman allegedly targeting his administration was thwarted Saturday night.
Trump initially declared in a Truth Social post that he intended to return to the stage and that the White House Correspondents’ Dinner would continue despite the shooting, before making a second post 19 minutes later announcing that he was returning to the White House after law enforcement agencies asked him to leave “consistent with protocol.” Trump explained the rationale behind the decision to Fox News’ Heinrich, who is on the board of the White House Correspondents’ Association, the group that hosted the event where the incident took place.
“I was taken by your response immediately after it happened. You said we’re going to continue the night, we’re not going to let this person derail our plans for the evening,” Heinrich, who appeared on stage with Trump during the dinner, told Trump over the phone. “Had you been told very quickly that there was no additional threat in the room? Is that why you felt comfortable proceeding if Secret Service allowed that to happen?”
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“Well, I hated a guy like this, sick, bad person. I hated somebody like that changing the course of our country … where you’d have all of these people, important people, not important people, all of these people gathered, record crowd … but that all of these people would have to leave. It’s just for what? For one nut? For one guy?” Trump responded. “That is really, I mean, look … he’s a very disturbed person, so I really wanted to go and I really wanted to, but the protocol was no.”
Trump, who survived two assassination attempts during the 2024 presidential campaign, went into further detail about why the Secret Service invoked protocol after he and other top administration officials were hustled from the ballroom at the Washington Hilton. Trump’s right ear was grazed by a bullet when a gunman fired shots during a rally at Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 of that year, while a Secret Service agent stopped Ryan Welsey Routh, who was waiting while Trump was playing a round of golf in Florida just two months later.
“You know, once those doors were open, that room was sealed, and once the doors were open because people were pouring in and there were police and they were Secret Service and they poured in a lot of them, but once those doors are open, it breaks the seal,” the president said. “And when they explained it, you know, maybe it’s possible somebody, if it were more than one person, somebody could have come in.”
“I really wanted to do it that night, even if we stayed late into the night. But we did the right thing and we came back to the White House, we did a news conference and explained what happened and now we’re doing it a little bit more by talking to you, but we did the right thing,” Trump added.
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