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Today: Arraignment For Suspect Accused of Opening Fire At Press Gala; President Trump To Welcome King Charles For State Visit; Trump Cancels Envoy's Trip To Pakistan For Peace Talks. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired April 27, 2026 - 07:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL)

[07:31:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: The developing news this morning. The suspect accused of opening fire at the White House Correspondents' Dinner will make his first appearance today in federal court. He's been identified as 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen. Allen is a part-time teacher from Torrence, California.

Authorities say he traveled via train to D.C. and checked into the hotel where the White House Correspondents' Dinner took place.

President Trump posted a video of him. You see it there. Police say it shows him charging through a security checkpoint and then afterwards police say he exchanged gunfire with law enforcement before he was subdued. And you saw that picture of him down on the ground.

Joining me now is CNN law enforcement analyst Jonathan Wackrow and former FBI agent Bryanna Fox. Thank you both for being here.

Jonathan, I'll start with you. When you look at the scenario of what happened here -- and this was on a floor above the dinner, but it is where all of the cabinet members just about came through on the red carpet -- happening after that red carpet portion of all this.

Was there a breakdown in security or is this how things are supposed to operate?

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST, FORMER SECRET SERVICE AGENT: Well, good morning, Sara.

You know, first of all, the security plan that was developed by the Secret Service worked in its most critical detail. The attacker was stopped and there was no loss of life.

But to answer your question there's always room for improvement, right? Whenever you're operating such a high-profile, high-security event that is co-joined in a public hotel there's always things that can be modified and changed from a security operational standpoint moving forward.

And that's why the Secret Service is going to go back. They are going to conduct a mission assurance review to see if there's anything that they can do better. Not saying that they did anything wrong but the intent here is to ensure that as these events get larger and more prominent -- I mean, think about how many political leaders we had gathered in one room.

Most notably, I think what will come out of this is a change in designation on how the Secret Service and more specifically DHS actually designates these types of events where you have the president and vice president, and many members who are in the line of succession to the office of the presidency -- how that designation changes and how resources are applied more wholly from a whole of government approach moving forward.

SIDNER: And those are interesting points, you know, just from your perspective.

Bryanna, I want to get to you about some of the things that we're learning -- that police are saying about what they've gathered so far concerning the suspect, including some writings that suggest his anti- administration motive.

This is -- this is a little different because when you look at what's happened in the past with presidents -- including, of course, President Trump who has had two assassination attempts against him -- this wasn't just focused on the president, was it?

BRYANNA FOX, FORMER FBI AGENT, CRIMINOLOGY PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA: Right. This is different. I mean, there's differences in both the shooter and his background. Where he came from and how normal he was in a way. Also, his target. So he said specifically he had societal grievances and, you know, that's something that we see, you know. It's a generational thing that we always see. However, this was different. He was not just upset about President Trump in particular but about the administration overall.

He said he had rage. It was the last line in his letter. He had rage when he felt what the administration was doing was wrong. I mean, that was from his personal opinion. But the difference is he decided to take violent action to try to address it. That's the thing that crosses the line, that is unacceptable. And so we see this now -- you know, in hindsight, the escalation that was building.

The question is how do we spot it sooner and what do we do? A lot of the research on this was conducted in the '80s, the '90s, and this was before social media --

SIDNER: Right.

FOX: -- or AI. Before you could ask a computer for the feedback that you're seeking. So I think the research now has to address this and how we can start seeing these red flags and intervene sooner.

[07:35:05]

SIDNER: Yeah. You bring up a really good point, and I want to kind of push forward with that with you, Jonathan, because we've talked before about this idea of lone wolf, which is the hardest attack to try to thwart. But there is a whole culture surrounding -- there's a gun culture. There is a culture of political violence that we're seeing heightened over the years.

Give us some sense of how you see this idea of lone wolf and how that has changed because of, in part, social media.

WACKROW: Yeah, Sara, great point. And, you know, I want to state that acting alone does not mean that this individual is uninfluenced. And when we talk about what's going on there what we're really talking about is this assassination culture concept that we've seen stemming from -- and also referred to as the Mangione effect.

And this incident actually, and the suspect, really fits into the broader concern around this new culture, which is really this normalization of violent fantasies, specifically towards public officials, especially in the digital domain.

And when you have somebody that takes a grievance and has these ideations of violence and then finds an ideological group -- I mean, this individual referred to himself in the manifesto as the "friendly, federal assassin" right? So this really, you know, pushes this into an ideologically driven incident. You take that and you foster that animus, that hate, the grievance within this echo chamber and what ends happening is you lower the psychological barriers to attacking another human being.

Again, what we're all asking is how did this, you know, mechanical engineer, this tutor go from being in the world of academia to launching an attack at one of the most fortified sites in the United States on Saturday? Again, this turn in political hostility is being normalized and killing is being normalized under the assassination culture construct.

So to Bryanna's point, we actually have to find these data threads out there to identify how do we get ahead of this assassination culture to suppress and stop the next attack.

SIDNER: Yeah. Like Bryanna said, there needs to be a rethink because of the world that we live in now that's very different from the '80s and the '90s where there wasn't really social media around.

Jonathan Wackrow and Bryanna Fox, thank you both so much -- appreciate it. Great conversation -- John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. With us now, Congressman Warren Davidson, a Republican from Ohio. Congressman, thank you so much for being with us this morning.

At this event I think, like, five of the top six people in the constitutional line of succession.

What questions, if any, do you have about the security surrounding this event?

REP. WARREN DAVIDSON (R-OH) (via Webex by Cisco): Well, you think about the whole concept up there, you think about a time when we're in conflict with Iran. Iran's top leadership was convened in a bunker and their whole leadership was taken out.

Here, in a hotel in a major city -- you know, the nation's capital, we have essentially our whole chain of command in one place. So people say well, that's a lot of vulnerability. Well, in a way, but it's also a flex. It's saying, you know, Iran, there's really nothing you can do about it. Here's -- shed tears, whatever, but you can't influence things in the United States. To the extent someone could, you had a guy -- a lone gunman come running through a security perimeter.

And the way to think about this I think is at the airport when you first go in -- well, you don't have security right there. You have to go to the counter and drop your luggage off, and all that. Once you reach the magnetometers and the security people -- you run past that, how far can you get into the airport? This is obviously a much more secure place than the airport and so he didn't get very far.

So you look at the reaction. I think it was swift. And I think they'll look at the video that everyone has seen at this point and say yeah, there's things we could have done to stop him, you know, as he was obviously already running towards the magnetometer and people were looking inwards instead of outwards. So just pulling security on the objective there were probably things that they will say could do better.

I think one of the things we could do better is fund them, and so Congress has not passed their funding bill appropriately this entire fiscal year, frankly.

BERMAN: Yeah. I mean, Jonathon Wackrow just said basically the same thing you did -- former Secret Service agent. Yeah, it worked. Can we learn? Sure. You can always learn and improve there. So it's interesting -- it'll be interesting to see when they go through this what they change for events like this going forward.

On the funding, you know, DHS has not been funded. However, recently, Secret Service members have been paid through emergency funding, correct?

DAVIDSON: Yeah, correct. I mean, President Trump is using money that we appropriated from the big, beautiful bill to really deal with a surge responding to, frankly, an invasion of our country by exploiting our laws. Secretary Mayorkas was supposed to secure our border. Instead, the flooded the country with people that came in illegally. We were trying to react to that and that's what we appropriated the money for.

[07:40:00]

So instead, President Trump is draining those resources just to keep day-to-day operations going so that the people that are essential enough to be at work are paid.

I think that's why we need to pass the Shutdown Fairness Act -- Senator Ron Johnson has had this -- and say look, if you're so essential that you need to be at work, the payroll clerk is essential too. In the private sector if you had people work and didn't pay them, that's called payroll theft, but the government exempts themselves from that law. We need to change that, and we need to pass appropriations.

BERMAN: You know, you mentioned Iran, talking about the security. Obviously, the difference -- the vast disparity in the security officials in Iran versus the United States.

As far as the negotiations go, Axios is reporting that some faction of the Iranians made an offer to open the Strait of Hormuz. An agreement to open the strait in exchange for delaying discussions about their nuclear capabilities and the enriched uranium.

How do you feel about that offer?

DAVIDSON: I feel encouraged. This is a sign that the blockade is working. And Iran's economy is very dependent upon oil and when you pump oil every day you've got to ship oil every day. Right now they can't ship it. So they don't want to turn off their wells. They've got to find a place to put all the oil and they're running out of options.

So I think the strategic patience is paying off and I think that highlights why we shouldn't have things like, you know, Democrat leader Hakeem Jeffries trying to undermine the negotiations by brining war powers resolutions to the floor while we're actively trying to resolve the conflict and wind it down.

BERMAN: Just two quick follows on that.

Number one, would you be in favor of delaying discussions about the nuclear issue in order to open the strait?

DAVIDSON: No. I think we get a comprehensive solution here and I think strategic patience is producing the kind of --

BERMAN: Um-hum.

DAVIDSON: You know, it's start to the negotiation, and I wouldn't want to turn it off. I think the dialogue is improving and, you know, hopefully we can find a resolution. The administration hasn't said Iran can't have nuclear power. They've just said you can't have a nuclear weapon.

And so we need the leadership of Iran to figure out who is leading the country. Who can speak with authority for the country because we've seen civilian leaders be undermined by the IRGC in the past. And then we need to make a deal that we believe will stick.

BERMAN: Very quickly, you mentioned the war powers resolution. You do have strong feelings about war powers generally. You do think Congress needs to be involved much of the time.

We're up against the 60-day deadline, depending on when you count. Do you think that matters? Do you think 60 days in this case does trigger a different legal situation? DAVIDSON: Yeah. I think the more decisive date is 90 because even at 60 days, you're supposed to begin winding down operations. And I think by 90 even the most off-base interpretation of the War Powers Act says -- some people have applied it to say well, for 90 days the president can do whatever he wants. That's not what it says but the practice has been, you know, pretty loose on this.

And so I think after 90 days it really is incumbent upon the administration to resolve. Are we going to keep the War Powers resolution or repeal it because it's not unprecedented that presidents would ignore the War Powers Act but it -- and it's also not unjust what we're doing necessarily in Iran, but it is unconstitutional.

And so think this is a war of choice. Congress should vote. The founding fathers had that debate. If you want to change the Constitution fine, but Article 1 says Congress has the authority to declare wars or authorize the combat. The main difference between a declaration and an authorization is scope.

BERMAN: Congressman Warren Davidson, we will check back in with you then within the next 30 days as we get closer -- if it gets closer to that 90-day deadline.

Thanks so much for being with us this morning -- Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And one immediate question. After this weekend's scare at the White House Correspondents' Dinner was will the king's visit be canceled in light of it? The British royal family quickly answered that the state visit is still on. King Charles and Queen Camilla -- they are moving forward as planned this week with a few possible security changes. The royals will arrive this afternoon, kicking off a four-day trip to mark America's 250th anniversary.

During this four-day visit the king is expected to meet privately with President Trump and deliver a rare address before Congress.

Let's get over to London. CNN's Salma Abdelaziz is there with much more on this. What else are we learning about this state visit now and how important this is?

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kate, this is extremely important. It's being billed as historic. It's being billed, of course, as an opportunity to improve relations between the U.K. and the U.S., which have been strained as of late because of disagreements that President Trump has had with this country's government when it comes to the Iran war. When it comes to the Iran conflict. So this is a very important moment.

You mentioned, of course, that statement that came out yesterday after those horrific events, of course, at the White House Correspondents' Dinner where the King -- where Buckingham Palace emphasized the everything will go ahead. The king will carry on with the visit as normal.

[07:45:05] I want to read you exactly what Buckingham Palace wrote. "Following discussions on both sides of the Atlantic through the day and acting on advice of government, we can confirm the state visit by their majesties will proceed as planned. The king and queen are most grateful to all those who have worked at pace to ensure this remains the case and are looking forward to the visit getting underway tomorrow."

You really emphasized the main point there Kate, just how quickly the statement came out -- just within hours on Sunday evening, something that President Trump quickly praised as well. He said in interviews that he sees King Charles as a friend. That he was very much looking forward to the visit.

It is an absolutely packed four-day agenda. We are going to see the king and queen land in the United States in just a few hours' time and the first thing they're going to do is, of course, meet with their hosts, President Trump and the first lady, at the White House. They're going to have a private tea with them. Later they're going to have a garden party at the British ambassador's residence.

But the key event, as you mentioned, will be tomorrow when the king addresses Congress. This is the first time in decades that a monarch has done this, and it will be an opportunity for him to speak not just to American lawmakers but to the American people as well, Kate.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely.

Great to see you, Salma. Thank you so much. Much more to come on this today -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right. Thank you so much, Kate.

This morning oil prices hitting a three-week high after an Iranian official warned that the Strait of Hormuz will under no circumstances return to what it was before the war. Brent crude, the global benchmark, rising to $108 a barrel while the U.S. benchmark is hovering just below $97 a barrel.

No deal seems to be in sight as the war with Iran approaches the two- month mark, prolonging the oil disruption and hiking prices of jet fuel and gas around the world.

Here at home gas prices rose overnight. The national average now at $4.11 a gallon, up seven cents from just last week but still below the peak we saw earlier in the month.

All right. Ahead, 40 million people under a severe weather threat today. It's as tornadoes ripped through the Midwest. We'll tell you where to expect the potential damaging storms going forward.

Plus, a bullet heading for a Florida deputy's chest and the only thing that stopped it was the camera he was wearing. We've got that video. That's ahead.

(COMMERCIAL) [07:52:15]

BERMAN: All right. This morning we are awaiting the first court appearance of the suspect in the White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting.

The president, in an interview with "60 MINUTES" overnight on the event itself and the investigation. There was one question he really did not like.

Let's get to CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter for the latest on this. Good morning to you. Long time no see.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: Yeah, hey -- good morning.

Axios put it really well this morning. It said, "One uncomfortable question was all it took for President Trump to resume hostilities with the media."

Here is that exchange with CBS' Norah O'Donnell from last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NORAH O'DONNELL, CORRESPONDENT, "60 MINUTES": He writes this. "Administration officials -- they are targets." And he also wrote this. "I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes."

What's your reaction to that?

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I was waiting for you to read that because I knew you would because you're horrible people -- horrible people. Yeah, he did write that. I'm not a rapist. I didn't rape anybody. Uh, I'm not a pedophile.

O'DONNELL: Oh, you think -- you think he was referring to you?

TRUMP: Excuse me. Excuse me. I'm not a pedophile. You read that crap from some sick person. You should be ashamed of yourself reading that because I'm not any of those things and I was never -- excuse me.

O'DONNELL: Mr. President, these are the gunman's words.

TRUMP: Excuse me. You shouldn't be reading that on "60 MINUTES." You're a disgrace.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STELTER: I want to tell you two things about that. Number one, this is President Trump as we've always known him. This is not surprising. What was surprising was that on Saturday night he was calm and respectful. He showed, you know, a different demeanor toward the Press Corps. People wondered if that was going to last. Now we know it's not going to last. His final post on Truth Social before the dinner was attacking The New York Times, and now he's mad at CBS. I also want to note that CBS is owned by Paramount, which is trying to buy WB, the parent company of CNN. On Thursday night in Washington, Paramount held a dinner honoring the Trump White House. The president was there. Norah O'Donnell was reportedly there was well, and I don't know that for a fact, but it was reported that she was there.

So there was this report about schmoozing between CBS and Trump. And yet, on Sunday night a tough, important, fair interview by CBS of the president, one the president bristled at. I just want viewers to notice that as you read abut Paramount trying to take over CNN.

BERMAN: And on the subject of the dinner, the president, from the very beginning Saturday night, was saying he hopes it is rescheduled.

What news is there on that front?

STELTER: I -- there's no news on that. We know the White House Correspondents' Association board is planning to meet to talk about that. But to use a dinner analogy John, I just don't know how much of an appetite there is for a do-over. Certainly, some people would like to see the show go on.

[07:55:00]

I want to see those awards handed out for outstanding White House coverage. But I also want to acknowledge that people who were at the Hilton are now going through what too many schoolchildren have gone through, mall shoppers, churchgoers. What too many Americans have experienced in the past. They are now processing the traumatic stress from the event on Saturday night.

John, you and I were live on the air together when the lockdown happened. I tried to stay very calm in the moment because I didn't want to speculate about what was happening around me. But after getting a good night's sleep I realized that what we went through inside the ballroom was like an active shooter drill. You had people yelling to get down. You had concerns about a stampede. There all sorts of things that could have gone wrong inside that ballroom, you know. Yeah, Secret Service agents securing the perimeter and, you know, pointing weapons out into the crowd.

So there's a dozen different ways that incident could have ended in tragedy and that is what attendees are now processing. And people are going to do that on different terms in their own ways on different timelines. I know some folks who were there have already reached out to therapists wanting to talk through it with counselors.

So my point is I'm sure that thousands of people who showed up on Saturday night necessarily want to do it again in a few weeks.

BERMAN: We will wait and see. And I've said this to your face, and I'll say it so everyone else can hear it too. Brian, you did such a good job Saturday night. We didn't know what was going on inside that room until Brian, on his cell phone, made a connection with us. And you were the first person to start reporting what was happening on the floor and give us a view of the situation, so terrific reporting. Good reporters do good reporting, so thank you very much.

STELTER: Thank you.

BERMAN: Sara.

SIDNER: All right. Thank you, John.

Today the danger of powerful tornadoes and other severe weather threatened 40 million people over the weekend where storms turned deadly leaving two people dead in Texas. In the Dallas-Fort Worth area officials say several people were injured and at least 20 families were displaced there.

The storm is now moving from Texas to Mississippi and then into the Midwest. Authorities are warning it could bring hail, damaging winds, and powerful tornadoes.

Also, newly-released footage from a Florida deputy's body camera showing the terrifying moment that he was shot. You see the man there pointed the gun at him. He credits his body camera with saving his life.

The deputy was investigating an assault at a home when video shows the suspect stepping out of the door and immediately opening fire on that officer. You see it happen there. One bullet deflected off the body camera right in the middle of the deputy's chest. The sheriff says it likely saved his life.

The deputy was also hit in the shoulder and leg. He is now recovering. The suspect has been arrested.

Video of a stunning aerial rescue. A Cal Fire helicopter crew managed to rescue a tree trimmer who was working in a palm tree there. He was about 75 feet in the air when he had a medical emergency. The worker was stranded in the tree for over an hour before he was rescued. A Cal Fire rescuer eventually managed to lower himself from the helicopter, swing through the air to reach the tree, and safely bring that worker to the paramedics on the ground.

The tree trimmer was taken to the hospital. He is in serious condition this morning.

In London, 100 Italian pastry chefs just did something completely unhinged and we love it. They broke the Guinness world record for the world's largest, longest tiramisu, stretching nearly 1,500 feet or more than four football fields. That's 19,000 eggs, 128,000 lady fingers, and a heck of a lot of mascarpone and espresso. I don't know why I said it like that.

BOLDUAN: Mascarpone -- get the (INAUDIBLE).

SIDNER: Mascarpone.

BOLDUAN: Mascarpone.

SIDNER: I don't -- I don't know. I got very -- I'm out of control. It took them five hours to put this thing together. Cheers erupted when the record was announced with chefs and supporters celebrating with the national Italian anthem. Then everyone got a box to take some of it home. Bellissimo, deliziosa! That's not -- that's not Italian.

BOLDUAN: I just want to talk about the espresso and the mascarpone.

SIDNER: Mascarpone and espresso -- yes.

BOLDUAN: So much.

SIDNER: Phil, get out here. We need you.

BOLDUAN: No, no, no. You've done quite enough.

OK, here we go. Let's turn to this right now. Right now Iran's foreign minister is in Russia to meet with Vladimir Putin. This comes after talks between the U.S. and Iran stalled over the weekend. Trump's negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner -- they were set to go to Pakistan for talks but then President Trump, as we know, canceled that trip this weekend.

Let's get to Nic Robertson. He's in Islamabad where those talks are supposed to take place. Nic, what are you hearing right now?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yeah. I don't think the Pakistani mediators have given up hope yet or even some of the U.S. officials that are here in Pakistan that it's all over. Sort of a lot of high-speed diplomacy going on by the Iranian foreign minister in Moscow in Russia right now -- St. Petersburg. He's met with the foreign minister there and he's due to meet with Vladimir Putin, the president.

He had this to say when he arrived in Russia. He said that there had been developments in the negotiations. He didn't get into details, of course, but he blamed the United States for the -- for the reason for the setbacks but he said we continue to review the situation.