A 21-year-old man pulled a firearm from a bag and opened fire near a White House security checkpoint Saturday evening, prompting Secret Service officers to shoot and kill him in an exchange of gunfire that also struck a bystander. The suspect, Nasire Best of Maryland, was the third gunman to target the area around the president in roughly four weeks.
The shooting occurred shortly after 6 p.m. EDT near the intersection of 17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, just steps from the White House grounds. President Trump was inside the building at the time but was not affected.
Secret Service chief of communications Anthony Guglielmi told The Hill that Best "pulled a weapon from his bag and began firing," and that Secret Service Police returned fire, striking the suspect. Best was transported to an area hospital, where he was pronounced dead. One bystander was also hit by gunfire during the incident. No officers were injured.
Best was not a stranger to the Secret Service. A law enforcement official told Reuters, as cited in The Hill's reporting, that the suspect was "emotionally disturbed" and had previously been issued a "stay-away" order. Fox News reported that Best had a history of mental health issues and multiple prior encounters with the Secret Service, including detentions for making threats and entering restricted areas.
That history raises an unavoidable question: how did a man already flagged by the agency charged with protecting the president manage to return to the perimeter with a loaded weapon?
Breitbart reported that Best had been arrested in July 2025 for attempting to enter a White House checkpoint without authorization and claiming to be Jesus Christ. Nearly a year later, he walked back to the same vicinity, armed.
The specific terms and duration of the stay-away order have not been disclosed. Nor have authorities detailed what, if any, monitoring was in place for a man with a documented fixation on the White House and a record of confrontations with federal law enforcement.
Saturday's shooting was the third armed attack in the vicinity of the president in approximately one month. The pattern is extraordinary and has no modern precedent in such a compressed timeframe.
The first incident involved 31-year-old Cole Allen, who exchanged gunfire with law enforcement at the hotel hosting the White House Correspondents' Association dinner while Trump was present. A federal grand jury indicted Allen on charges of attempting to assassinate the president, along with multiple firearms violations.
Just over a week later, 45-year-old Michael Marx opened fire on Secret Service officers near the Washington Monument on the National Mall. That confrontation occurred along the path of Vice President JD Vance's motorcade. A bystander was also shot in that incident. The office of U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro charged Marx with assaulting federal officers with a dangerous weapon, using and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence, and unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
Then came Saturday's attack by Best, the third gunman, the third exchange of fire, the third incident putting civilians and officers at risk in the same stretch of the nation's capital.
FBI Director Kash Patel posted on social media Saturday confirming the bureau was "on the scene and supporting Secret Service responding to shots fired near White House grounds." He added that the FBI would "update the public as we're able."
President Trump addressed the incident Sunday on Truth Social, describing Best as someone who "had a violent history and possible obsession with our Country's most cherished structure." He then connected the shooting to a broader argument about presidential security infrastructure, as the Washington Times also reported:
"This event is one month removed from the White House [Correspondents'] Dinner shooting, and goes to show how important it is, for all future Presidents, to get, what will be, the most safe and secure space of its kind ever built in Washington, D.C. The National Security of our Country demands it!"
The president was referencing a ballroom construction project at the White House, which he has framed as a security measure. The remark carries more weight now than it might have a month ago. Three separate armed individuals targeting the area around the sitting president in rapid succession is not a hypothetical threat scenario, it is the current reality.
Congress has already begun responding to the escalating danger. A Senate reconciliation bill recently steered $1 billion toward Secret Service funding for White House security upgrades, a figure that looks less like an extravagance with each passing week.
Several critical details remain unclear. The condition of the bystander struck by gunfire Saturday has not been publicly disclosed. Fox News reported that Best died en route to GW Medical Center, but authorities have not confirmed whether additional weapons were recovered at the scene or what type of firearm Best used.
The nature of Best's "violent history," as Trump described it, has not been fully detailed by law enforcement. What is known, prior arrests, prior detentions, a stay-away order, claims of being Jesus Christ at a checkpoint, paints a picture of a deeply troubled individual who repeatedly sought confrontation at the most heavily guarded address in the country.
As we previously reported when gunfire first erupted Saturday evening, the Secret Service response was swift and decisive. Officers engaged the threat and neutralized it before the president was ever in direct danger. That is exactly what the agency is trained to do, and the officers on scene performed under pressure.
But the fact that they keep having to do it, three times in a month, points to a problem that cannot be solved by marksmanship alone. The Washington Examiner identified Best as a 21-year-old Maryland male, and the broader question now facing federal law enforcement is whether the system that flagged him, issued him a stay-away order, and detained him before simply failed to prevent the inevitable next step.
A stay-away order is a piece of paper. It works only if someone enforces it, or if the person it targets has the capacity to obey it. When the subject is described by law enforcement as "emotionally disturbed," has been detained multiple times for threatening behavior at the White House, and has been observed near the building before, the gap between identifying a threat and actually stopping one becomes a matter of life and death.
The Secret Service has faced officer-involved shooting incidents near the White House with increasing frequency. Each time, the agency has performed its immediate protective mission. Each time, the underlying question goes unanswered: why do armed individuals keep reaching the perimeter?
Marx, the Washington Monument shooter, was a convicted felon in unlawful possession of a firearm. Allen, the Correspondents' Dinner shooter, now faces charges of attempted assassination. Best had a documented history of mental instability and prior encounters with the very agency he attacked.
None of these men should have been anywhere near the president with a loaded weapon. All three were.
The officers who put themselves between a gunman and the White House on Saturday deserve recognition. So do the officers who did the same thing the week before, and the week before that. But courage under fire is not a substitute for a system that keeps armed, unstable, and dangerous individuals from reaching the point of attack in the first place.
Three shootings in a month is not a trend. It is a crisis. And the people responsible for closing the gap between a stay-away order and an actual barrier had better figure out the difference before someone else with a bag full of grievances and a loaded gun decides to test the perimeter again.
