White House to review presidential security after shooting incident

The White House will convene a meeting early this week to discuss safety measures for major events involving President Donald Trump, following Saturday’s shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner that spurred fresh scrutiny of security practices.

 

The gathering, which will be held by Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, will include the White House operations team, US Secret Service and Department of Homeland Security leadership, according to a senior official who requested anonymity to discuss plans before they were made public.

 

Trump and the White House stand by the leadership of the Secret Service, the official said. The meeting was reported earlier by Reuters.

 

 

Some top officials have criticised security measures at the annual dinner held at the Washington Hilton, which is traditionally attended by thousands of people, including the president, vice president and senior Cabinet officials. Saturday was Trump’s first appearance at the dinner as president.

 

US House Speaker Mike Johnson said Monday that leadership at the Secret Service needs to “tighten up.” Security at the event seemed a “little lax”, he said in an interview with Fox News.

 

The participants are slated to discuss the processes and procedures that led to the apprehension of the gunman, whom authorities have accused of targeting Trump administration officials, and explore additional options to ensure everything possible is done to secure major presidential events, the official said. 

 

Trump to be rushed from the stage by Secret Service agents amid the incident and the dinner was eventually postponed. The armed assailant ran past a security checkpoint before being apprehended after a brief pursuit that included gunfire.