Patricia Heaton is calling on “her friends on the left” to tone down heated political rhetoric following the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.

On Saturday, President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, first lady Melania Trump and other top officials were evacuated from the Washington Hilton after shots were fired near the ballroom after a gunman exchanged fire with Secret Service agents in the lobby before being subdued and taken into custody.

When shots were fired, hundreds of attendees ducked under tables or took cover inside the ballroom before being evacuated, and the event was subsequently postponed.

On Sunday, Heaton, 68, wrote on X that although she disagreed with past Democratic presidents Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Joe Biden, she believes critics of political leaders should reject extreme language and violence.

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“I wasn’t happy when Clinton, Obama or Biden won, but I didn’t call them fascist/dangerous/threat to democracy. I didn’t hope someone would assassinate them. I went on with my life with gratitude. Friends on the left, please try this. Your life and our country will be better,” the “Everybody Loves Raymond” star said.

On Sunday, senior federal law enforcement sources confirmed to Fox News that the suspect told law enforcement he intended to target Trump administration officials.

Authorities have identified the suspect as 31-year-old Cole Allen, of Torrance, Calif., adding that he prepared a manifesto outlining his intent and shared anti-Trump and anti-Christian rhetoric on social media.

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As the WHCA was underway, Allen allegedly rushed a Secret Service checkpoint at the Washington Hilton while armed with multiple weapons and opened fire, striking a Secret Service officer in his ballistic vest.

Agents returned fire and tackled Allen to the ground. The suspect and the injured officer were transported to a hospital. The Secret Service agent is expected to make a full recovery and was released from the hospital Sunday.

The incident adds to a growing list of threats against President Donald Trump, including two confirmed assassination attempts and a recent incident involving an armed intruder at Mar-a-Lago.

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The White House said Sunday that Allen’s brother contacted the New London Police Department in Connecticut prior to the shooting, reporting that Allen had sent family members an alleged manifesto outlining his intent to target administration officials.

Officials also said Allen’s social media included anti-Trump and anti-Christian rhetoric.

Allen’s sister, Avriana Allen, told investigators in Rockville, Maryland, that her brother had made increasingly radical statements and often spoke about doing “something” to address issues in the world.

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Heaton has previously spoken out against inflammatory political discourse. Following the assassination of Charlie Kirk in September 2025, Heaton called out what she saw as the moral hypocrisy of people who were celebrating or mocking Kirk’s death online,

“The most violent rhetoric is always from people who have phrases like ‘choose kindness’ in their bios,” she tweeted at the time.

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Following the 2024 presidential election, Heaton slammed political pundits for “fear-mongering” and denigrating voters during the election cycle by telling them Trump posed a threat to their way of life.

“To all these extremists that are allowed television time, who told women that this is what is going to happen to them, shame on you! Shame on you!” she said in a video posted to X in November 2024.

 “Apparently, there are some really vulnerable people here who you targeted, and you fear-mongered to and you need to go back on the air and tell them things are going to be okay, tell them that they’re fine.”

“Also, stop saying people who voted differently from you are ‘uneducated’,” she continued. “Learn your f-ing lesson about smearing people who vote differently from you, who have different needs from you, who have legitimate complaints. Quit dismissing them as uneducated. When are you going to learn?”

The Strait of Hormuz crisis is driving nations’ efforts to develop alternative Gulf-to-Europe trade routes, with Iraq’s $24 billion “Development Road” project at the forefront, analyst says.

The route from Iraq’s Grand Faw Port to Turkey and on to Europe, is advancing “with discipline,” Middle East Council on Global Affairs analyst Muhanad Seloom told Fox News Digital, calling it a “permanent” and “transformative” wartime shift.

Seloom’s comments came as President Donald Trump warned Tehran against further escalation in the Gulf and signaled the U.S. is prepared to act to keep the strait open.

Iranian forces have laid mines and threatened commercial traffic in the narrow waterway. As of Sunday, the shipping route remains effectively closed.

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“Iraq’s Development Road means every container moving through Basra instead of Iranian-controlled waters is a reduction in Tehran’s leverage over Iraq,” said Seloom.

“The real scale, independent estimates put the Development Road closer to $24 billion, and the project is now moving with discipline,” he said.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani inaugurated the first 63-kilometer stretch of the Development Road in 2025. Phase 1 is due for completion by 2028.

“What was described by the Iraqi government as a flagship of Iraqi statecraft now has a regional rationale that governments and financiers treat as essential rather than aspirational,” Seloom, an assistant professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, explained.

“Sudani seems to be positioning Iraq exactly where he thinks its geography always suggested, as a connecting state between the Gulf, Turkey and Europe,” he said.

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But other regional infrastructure, Seloom says, is also being pushed forward in parallel.

Saudi Arabia’s East-West Petroline pipeline is operating near its 7 million-barrel-per-day capacity, with expansion plans under review.

The UAE’s ADCOP pipeline to Fujairah is also at maximum use, with a second line under discussion, he said. “Turkey’s Zangezur and Middle Corridors bypass Iran via the Caucasus and are four to five years out.”

He added: “Six Gulf-backed overland fiber projects are also underway through Syria, Iraq and the Horn of Africa.”

Iran reimposed closure measures on the Strait of Hormuz on April 18, reducing traffic to just a handful of vessels per day compared with a pre-war average of roughly 130 to 140.

The restrictions, including on ships, have come under fire in recent days, and interceptions trace back to the start of the war on Feb. 28, when Tehran first moved to block transit following U.S.-Israeli strikes.

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“Hormuz remains indispensable for energy, but it is no longer treated as a default. That shift is permanent given the war,” Seloom said.

For Iraq’s corridor, it is “potentially transformative,” Seloom said, with $4 billion per year in projected transit revenue and a repositioning from an oil rentier state to a logistics state.

“Turkey will be the single largest beneficiary. Combined with the Zangezur and Middle Corridors, Ankara becomes the overland bridge between Asia and Europe,” he said. “Europe will have an additional overland option on a 2028-plus timeline, but nothing for the current crisis. It marginally reduces structural dependence on the unreliable Suez–Red Sea axis.”

President Donald Trump conceded that he may have complicated the Secret Service’s evacuation process after the White House Correspondents’ Dinner Saturday night.

In a preview for a “60 Minutes” interview airing Sunday night, Trump described to CBS News correspondent Norah O’Donnell what was going on in his head during the quick process of Secret Service agents flanking him and ushering him and other administration officials out of the event after shots were fired.

O’Donnell pointed out that it took 10 seconds for an agent to reach him and another 20 seconds before he was taken out of the building. Trump admitted that some of the hesitation came from his desire to know what was happening.

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“Well, what happened is it was a little bit me,” Trump said. “I wanted to see what was happening, and I wasn’t making it that easy for them. I wanted to see what was going on. And by that time, we started to realize maybe it was a bad problem, different kind of a problem, bad one, and different than what would be normal noise from a ballroom, which you hear all the time. And I was surrounded by great people. And I probably made them act a little bit more slow. They said, ‘Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Let me see. Wait a minute.'”

Trump said that he and first lady Melania Trump were eventually told to get down and “pretty much” began crawling out of the room.

“I was standing up and then turned around the opposite direction and started pretty much walking out pretty tall, a little bent over because I, you know, I’m not looking to be standing too tall but I was walking out, was pretty about halfway there. And they said, ‘Please go down to the floor. Please go down to the floor.’ So I dropped to the floor. So did the first lady,” Trump said.

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Fox News Digital reached out to the Secret Service for comment.

Trump, his wife and several administration officials were quickly evacuated out of the dinner, abruptly ending the event. In a press conference shortly after the shooting, Trump confirmed that the shooter was in custody and that he has requested the White House Correspondents’ Association to reschedule the dinner some time within the next 30 days.

Cole Allen, a 31-year-old computer scientist from Torrance, California, was identified as the suspect accused of opening fire at the Washington Hilton Hotel.

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During a news conference Saturday night, authorities said Allen was armed with multiple weapons when he rushed a Secret Service checkpoint. He then allegedly opened fire on a Secret Service officer, who was taken to the hospital after being shot in his ballistic vest. The officer was then released from the hospital on Sunday.

Fox News confirmed with law enforcement sources with knowledge of the investigation that the suspect was targeting Trump administration officials.