President Trump reveled in a crowd of seniors in Florida in his first major public appearance since a gunman allegedly tried to kill him at White House Correspondents Association dinner last weekend.
“I shouldn’t be here,” Mr. Trump said Friday, noting the attempt on his life. “I should be indoors in a secure facility, where I can quietly, beautifully and safely play out my term, destroying everything that comes in our way, like bad countries that want to get nuclear weapons.”
Mr. Trump said others in his team would have preferred him to be in a more protected environment than the school gym in The Villages, where he gave his speech, ostensibly in support of tax policies in the One Big Beautiful Bill.
“They want me to be in a secure place,” he said. “I said, ’What’s more secure than the Villages?’”
Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, was arraigned in federal court after attempting to rush the dinner at the Washington Hilton on Saturday. Police say he was armed with a shotgun, a handgun and knives, and that he shot a law enforcement officer whose ballistic vest stopped the bullet.
Mr. Trump faced previous attempts on his life, including an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, during the 2024 campaign in which a bullet grazed his ear, and the arrest of an armed man near his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Earlier, when departing the White House, a reporter asked if he feared doing large events after the dinner incident.
“I don’t even think about it,” Mr. Trump said.
