During a press conference at the White House shortly after the shooting, Doocy brought up a New York Post report that said the suspect, identified as 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen, assembled a weapon at the Washington Hilton hotel.

“Why do you think this keeps happening to you?” Doocy directly asked the president in regard to the shooting.

“Well, you know, I’ve studied assassinations and I must tell you the most impactful people, the people that do the most, you take a look at the people — Abraham Lincoln — I mean, you go through the people that have gone through this where they got ’em. But the people that do the most, the people that make the biggest impact are the ones that they go after,” Trump replied.

The president has faced at least five major security breaches and assassination attempts since 2024, according to LiveNOW from Fox.

“They don’t go after the ones that don’t do much because they like it that way,” Trump continued. “And when you look at the people — whether it was an attempt or a successful attempt — they were very impactful people. Just take a look at the names here. The big names, and I hate to say I’m honored by that, but I’ve done a lot.”

Trump went on to say that there are many people who are “not happy” his administration has “changed this country.”

“We’ve done a lot. We have taken this country and we were a laughingstock for years and now we are the hottest country anywhere in the world,” he added. “We’ve changed this country, and there are a lot of people that are not happy about that. So I think that’s the answer, Peter.”

Watch Trump’s response to Doocy’s question below, starting at the 14:10 mark.