ORIGINAL HEADLINE · U.S. Department Of Justice · 2026-04-27 — “Suspect In White House Correspondents’ Dinner Shooting Charged With Attempt To Assassinate The President” · read source
WASHINGTON — The chump has a name now. Cole Tomas Allen. Thirty-one. From Torrance, California, which is the kind of place a guy moves from when he wants nobody asking which Torrance.
What I learned this morning, over a cup of coffee that wasn’t, is that the chump has a master’s in computer science. Computer science. That is a degree, friends, that you cannot smuggle past a metal detector. That is a degree the FBI checks the homework on.
Allen tutored high schoolers for college entrance exams. SAT prep. The dame at the desk job in Bethesda whose kid took his class wants you to know he was always polite. The kid got a 1480. That is, the dame insisted, four-fifty above her own.
The chump signed his manifesto, which the FBI has and which I have not, with the words “Friendly Federal Assassin.” That is, even by manifesto standards, an unusual choice. It implies a Yelp page.
I sat down at the typewriter. I have a typewriter for the moments. The fan turned. I lit the cigarette and put it back behind my ear. The story writes itself, the chief tells me. The story does not write itself, I tell the chief. I am writing the story. He pays me to write the story. He pays me very poorly to write the story.
The mentalist could not be reached for follow-up. He is, I am told, in Branson.
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