President Donald Trump has sparked controversy by joking that NFL teams should sign Cole Thomas Allen, the man who stormed past security at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday night. Chilling surveillance footage captured Allen, 31, a teacher from Torrance, California, dashing past Secret Service agents and law enforcement at the Washington Hilton Hotel.
Allen sprinted through a security checkpoint and attempted to reach the ballroom where President Trump, senior cabinet members, and thousands of journalists were gathered. During a '60 Minutes' interview aired on Sunday, CBS News anchor Norah O'Donnell asked Trump how Allen managed to get so close. The President, who had to crawl on the floor to safety, responded: 'I think the NFL should sign him up. He was fast.'
Security Failures Exposed
Trump praised law enforcement's professionalism, noting that agents drew their weapons immediately. 'When you look at it on tape, it’s almost like a blur,' he said. 'But it was amazing, because as soon as they saw that, you could see them draw their guns. They were so professional.'
Police revealed Allen was armed with a shotgun, handgun, and multiple knives. He exchanged fire with Secret Service agents before being tackled and arrested. One agent was struck in his bulletproof vest and is expected to recover. No one else was harmed.
Manifesto Details
Allen's manifesto, sent to his family ten minutes before the attack, was published by the New York Post. It detailed his reasoning and criticized security lapses. 'What the hell is the Secret Service doing?' he wrote, describing a 'sense of arrogance' at the hotel. He claimed security was so lacking that he could have brought a machine gun unnoticed.
In the manifesto, Allen referred to President Trump as a 'pedophile, rapist, and traitor,' though Trump has denied these allegations. Trump later clashed with O'Donnell during the interview, calling her a 'disgrace' for reading excerpts from the manifesto. 'I am not a rapist. I didn't rape anybody,' he said, adding that he was 'totally exonerated' from any connection to Jeffrey Epstein.
