WASHINGTON — US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that the suspect accused of trying to attack administration officials at Saturday night’s White ​House Correspondents’ Association dinner was a “pretty sick guy” who had an anti-Christian manifesto. Trump said in TV interviews that the suspect’s family previously expressed concerns about him to law enforcement officials. The suspect, whom an official identified as 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen, of Torrance, California, was arrested at the scene of the event in Washington, D.C.

“He was a Christian, believer, and ‌then he became an anti-Christian, and he had a lot of change,” Trump told CBS’s “60 Minutes” programme. “He was probably a pretty sick guy.”

The manifesto was sent to members of Allen’s ​family shortly before the attack, a law enforcement official told Reuters. In it, the suspect called himself the “Friendly Federal Assassin,” the official said.

“Turning the other cheek when *someone else* is oppressed is not Christian behaviour; it is complicity in the oppressor’s crimes,” the manifesto read, according to the official.

Targets listed in the manifesto included administration officials – although not FBI Director Kash Patel – prioritised from highest-ranking to lowest, the official said.

The manifesto mocked the “insane” lack of security at the Washington Hilton, where the dinner was held, the official added.

“Like, ​the one thing that I immediately noticed walking into the hotel is the sense of arrogance,” the manifesto’s author reportedly wrote. “I walk in with multiple weapons and not a single person there considers the possibility that I could be a threat.” The chaotic events raised fresh questions about the security of top US officials, many of whom were gathered in the hotel’s expansive ballroom. Trump seized on the attention brought by the incident to promote his planned White House ballroom as a safer venue for such events.

“This event would never have happened with the Militarily Top Secret Ballroom currently under construction at the White House. It cannot be built fast enough!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. The suspect travelled by Amtrak train from Los Angeles to Chicago and then to Washington, checking into the Hilton on Friday, acting US Attorney General ‌Todd Blanche said on multiple Sunday talk shows, adding that Trump and top members of his administration were the likely targets. Train passengers in the United States are not required to pass through airport-style metal detectors.

Amtrak said ⁠it is cooperating with the investigation.