An investigation is ongoing.
Law enforcement authorities are responding to shots that were fired near the White House grounds, FBI Director Kash Patel said.
Journalists working there Saturday reported hearing a series of gunshots and were told to seek shelter inside the press briefing room, where U.S. Secret Service officers prevented them from leaving.
There were no immediate reports of any injuries. On X, Secret Service said it was “aware of reports of shots fired near 17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW” — one block from the White House — and was “working to corroborate the information with personnel on the ground.”
In a social media post, Patel said officers were responding to shots fired and said he would “update the public as we’re able.”
President Donald Trump was inside the White House at the time.
The Metropolitan Police Department did not immediately respond to requests for information.
In a post shared on X, Selina Wang, the senior White House correspondent for ABC News, shared dramatic video of the moment she said she heard what “sounded like dozens of gunshots” and ducked for cover.
Writing that she had been performing a task that reporters at the White House do day in and day out — filming themselves on a cellphone, for a social media post — Wang’s video shows her speaking for a few seconds about Trump’s statements earlier Saturday about a potential Iran deal.
The Metropolitan Police Department said on its X Account that the Secret Service was working the scene and cautioned people to avoid the area. The scene is near where a gunman ambushed two members of the West Virginia National Guard last November.
The gunfire Saturday comes nearly a month after what law enforcement authorities said was an attempted assassination of the president on April 25 as he attended the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner at a Washington hotel.
Following that scare, Secret Service officers shot a suspect they said had fired at officers near the Washington Monument, also near the White House.
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Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
