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The mentalist Oz Pearlman, the main performer at the 105th Annual White House Correspondents' Dinner, described this Sunday how he experienced the shooting from the presidential table, just inches away from President Donald Trump, and confessed that at that moment he thought "the room was about to explode."
The incident occurred around 8:36 p.m. on Saturday at the Washington Hilton hotel in Washington D.C., when the suspect Cole Thomas Allen, 31 years old, burst into the lobby security checkpoint armed with a shotgun, a handgun, and several knives, and fired between five and eight shots before being subdued by Secret Service agents and police.
Pearlman, who at that moment was with Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, shared his experiences in interviews with CNN and The New York Times.
"I was guessing a name that Karoline was thinking of, and just as I revealed the answer in my notebook, we heard the noise," the mentalist explained to the New York newspaper.
Her first reaction was to think it was a tray of dishes falling to the ground or a medical emergency, but the firm response from the Secret Service immediately revealed to her the seriousness of the situation.
Pearlman dropped to the ground, fearing it was a bomb attack. It was then that the agents forcefully tackled the president, leaving the leader face to face with the artist.
“They took him down with a lot of force; it was a tackle like in the National Football League. We were face to face, less than 30 centimeters apart. We stared at each other for about two seconds. It was the craziest sight of my life,” Pearlman recalled to CNN, before Trump was evacuated from the room.
The mentalist had to crawl on the ground to get out of the place. "I didn't want to get up; I thought that if I did, they would shoot me," he told the same network.
A member of the Uniformed Division of the Secret Service was injured by a bullet, but his bulletproof vest prevented fatal injuries. There were no civilian casualties among the approximately 2,600 guests present in the main hall.
Trump confirmed the arrest of the shooter that same night on Truth Social, and the following day he held a press conference at the White House where he stated: "No one told me this job was so dangerous."
This is considered the third assassination attempt against Trump in less than two years, following the attack in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024, and the attempt in West Palm Beach, Florida, on September 15, 2024.
Allen, a school teacher residing in Torrance, California, remains under hospital custody for psychiatric evaluation. The assistant prosecutor announced imminent charges that include the use of a firearm during a violent crime and assault on a federal officer, and he is expected to appear before a federal court in Washington D.C. this Monday.
"There were people who could have lost their lives tonight. Thank God, the officer who was shot is doing well," Pearlman concluded.
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