White House correspondents’ dinner rescheduled for July 24
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, Melania Trump, U.S. President Donald Trump, and Weijia Jiang attend as Mentalist Oz Pearlman hosts The White House Correspondents Dinner at Washington Hilton, April 25, 2026. (Kevin Mazur/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The White House correspondents’ dinner has been rescheduled for July 24, after a shooting forced the cancellation of the annual event in April, White House Correspondents’ Association president Weijia Jiang said.
“Rescheduling was not automatic. It was a choice that the WHCA board made after thoughtful consideration and input from our members,” she said in a statement.
Cole Allen, 31, is accused of trying to assassinate President Donald Trump at the April 25 dinner at the Washington Hilton hotel. He was tackled by law enforcement after rushing through a security checkpoint at the hotel, where thousands of journalists as well as Trump and members of his Cabinet were gathered for the annual event, according to prosecutors.
Allen allegedly wrote that administration officials were his targets, according to a criminal complaint.
Allen has pleaded not guilty to attempted assassination of the President of the United States, assault on a federal law enforcement officer with a deadly weapon, transportation of a firearm and ammunition over state lines with the intent to commit a felony and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence.
Jiang said the rescheduled dinner “will not only be an opportunity to carry out our program. It will be a statement that violence has no place in American life and a free press will not be intimidated into silence.”
“Our thoughts remain with the officer who was injured and with everyone who experienced that evening,” she added. “We are indebted to the US Secret Service, law enforcement and the hotel staff whose swift response protected our guests and our staff.”
Jiang did not say where July’s dinner will be held.
The U.S. Supreme Court building on May 4, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Supreme Court on Monday issued an administrative stay of a lower court order that had rolled back access to mifepristone nationwide.
The move preserves access to the abortion pill without the need for an in-person doctor’s visit.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis attends the Boom Belt: A Return to First Principles in Public Markets conference on April 7, 2026, in Miami, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday unveiled a proposed new congressional map for the Sunshine State that his office indicates could let Republicans flip up to four seats in the U.S. House of Representatives.
It’s a move that could help the party gain seats and counter Democrats’ recent redistricting victory in Virginia, if the map passes the Legislature and survives likely legal challenges. But some in the state are concerned about how a new map might backfire on the GOP. It is also another volley in mid-decade redistricting around the country, as another state starts the process usually only done once a decade in the wake of Texas, California and other states doing so.
The new map, provided to ABC News by the governor’s office, appears to aim to allow Republicans to flip up to four seats in the U.S. House, leaving just four Democratic-held districts in the state.
The office did not provide any details on how it conducted its analysis, and DeSantis said the redraw is about representation. “Florida got shortchanged in the 2020 Census, and we’ve been fighting for fair representation ever since. … Our new map for 2026 makes good on my promise to conduct mid-decade redistricting, and it more fairly represents the makeup of Florida today,” DeSantis told Fox News Digital, which was first to report on the new map being unveiled.
Dave Wasserman, senior editor and elections analyst for The Cook Political Report, wrote on Monday that the map appears to target Democratic Reps. Darren Soto, Kathy Castor, Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
Soto wrote on X, “Gerrymander or Dummymander? This map is an absolutely unlawful violation of the Florida Constitution. The Legislature should reject it. The courts should strike it down. That being said, there are 12+ seats that Democrats could still win under this map in this cycle.”
The speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, Daniel Perez, confirmed in a memo on Monday that the state House had received the new map and would begin considering it on Tuesday.
An aggressive approach
DeSantis has said Florida’s potential redistricting has nothing to do with Virginia’s efforts to redraw its congressional map, which passed last week and could net Democrats four congressional seats if it survives court challenges.
Some within the Republican Party have said Florida should aggressively redraw its map to counter Virginia, although others have hedged.
President Donald Trump, for instance, was asked by Fox News in an interview on Sunday about his reaction to Virginia’s redistricting and if Florida should ‘make a go at it.’ (Florida is Trump’s home state.) “I do, but that Virginia case is terrible,” Trump responded.
A Republican strategist in Florida told ABC News, “I think the people who are interested in taking the most aggressive, fighteresque approach … feel a bit emboldened” by what happened in Virginia. “The people taking a more strategic, long-term take on this whole process — I don’t think what happened in Virginia changes their opinion at all.”
Democrats ready to counter
DeSantis had called a special session that’s currently set to begin Tuesday that will include considering mid-decade redistricting, although he had previously delayed the initial date of the session by a week and expanded it to add other issues.
The Legislature also has a complex relationship with the governor, and legislators have been relatively tight-lipped over how it will vote.
The governor has spoken often about mid-decade redistricting in Florida in recent months, but framed his thoughts in terms of Florida needing to redraw its maps due to population reasons — not for political gain.
But Democrats, flush off of a victory in Virginia, say that they’re ready to counter GOP moves. The Virginia election’s certification is currently being litigated in courts.
Could it backfire?
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, during a press conference last Wednesday, called potential redistricting in Florida a “DeSantis dummymander” that would backfire on the GOP by weakening seats they currently hold.
“Our message to Florida Republicans is, ‘F around and find out’,” Jeffries said. “If they go down the road of a ‘DeSantis Dummymander’, the Florida Republicans are going to find themselves in the same situation as Texas Republicans who are on the run right now.”
DeSantis, responding to Jeffries on Wednesday without bringing up redistricting, taunted, “There’s nothing that could be better for Republicans in Florida than to see Hakeem Jeffries everywhere around this state … please, be my guest to come down in Florida. We would love to have you.”
Some Republicans, however, have openly expressed concerns that any new map in Florida would endanger GOP-held districts because it would weaken those districts politically as it tries to flip other ones, due to how voters could be moved around or respond to redistricting. It’s a key concern in Florida for the GOP, where Hispanic voters — a major bloc — who had moved towards the GOP in 2024’s elections now appear to be moving towards Democrats.
“Don’t do it. I’ve said it from the beginning. I’ve been around enough reapportionments to know it’s a slippery slope,” Florida Rep. Daniel Webster told Punchbowl News last week.
And Florida Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar told NBC News last week, “Look, I may be at a disadvantage, because my lines in district number 27 in the state of Florida may be moved, but there’s nothing I can do about it. And I always look at the bright side. This is American democracy. This is the American electoral system.”
The law and Florida’s Constitution
There are legal considerations at play as well that were not the case in other states such as Texas, California and Missouri that redistricted — as Florida’s state Constitution also has strict restrictions on redrawing constitutional maps for political gain, thanks to provisions known as the Fair Districts Amendments that voters approved in 2010.
The state’s Constitution says that “In establishing congressional district boundaries … No apportionment plan or individual district shall be drawn with the intent to favor or disfavor a political party or an incumbent.”
“It imposes an explicit prohibition on intentionally redrawing districts to favor or disfavor a political party or an incumbent,” Jonathan Marshfield, a state constitutional law expert at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, told ABC News.
“And so this is significant in Florida, because the United States Supreme Court hasheld … that these were sort of partisan gerrymandering claims are not justiciable in federal court; [there’s] essentially no recourse in the same way in federal court as there is in a state court. One of the challenges, I can imagine, is that these new congressional maps are going to be challenged as not complying with the Fair District Amendment of 2010.”
Marshfield added that “the law is structured such that challenges will, in fact, focus on their actual intent in drawing the lines where they draw them. And so that is a legally relevant inquiry that will be investigated in the course of the litigation.
DeSantis did not address the amendments in his comments to Fox News. But his general counsel, David Axelman, in a letter sent to the Florida Legislature along with the proposed map, argued that the amendments themselves may be unconstitutional.
“Florida’s representation in the U.S. House has also been distorted by considerations of race. Passed in 2010, the Fair Districts Amendments (FDA) to the Florida Constitution require the Legislature to account for race when drawing congressional districts … This requires the use of race in redistricting-something that the U.S. Supreme Court has signaled is unconstitutional.”
A strategist working with Florida House Democrats told ABC News that Democrats in the Legislature don’t have procedural mechanisms or leeway to slow down the process of passing a map, unlike in Texas in 2025 where Democrats were able to depart the state and break “quorum” in order to hold up legislation. But the strategist said that won’t matter, and that it doesn’t matter if the new map benefits Republicans or not.
A strategist working with Florida House Democrats told ABC News that Democrats in the Legislature don’t have the same procedural mechanism or leeway to slow down the process of passing a map, unlike in Texas in 2025 where Democrats were able to depart the state and break “quorum” in order to hold up legislation. But the strategist said that won’t matter, and that it doesn’t matter if the new map benefits Republicans or not.
“Regardless of if it backfires or not, it’s still illegal,” the strategist argued.
But Marshfield said that those drawing the map will likely have taken the amendment into account: “I’m sure in light of that, that the people drawing the lines, I would assume — I think the courts assume — that they have taken care to comply with the law, so that they are taking care to draw the lines in ways that comply with that amendment.”
U.S. President Donald Trump delivers the State of the Union address during a joint session of Congress in the House Chamber at the Capitol on February 24, 2026, in Washington, DC. Trump delivered his address days after the Supreme Court struck down the administration’s tariff strategy, and amid a U.S. military buildup in the Persian Gulf threatening Iran. (Photo by Kenny Holston-Pool/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Monday claimed the U.S. was “very nearly under threat” from Iran, contradicting U.S. intelligence assessments as he sought to justify his administration’s ongoing attack.
“An Iranian regime armed with long-range missiles and nuclear weapons would be an intolerable threat to the Middle East, but also to the American people,” Trump said at a medal of honor ceremony at the White House, marking his first public remarks on the military operation.
“Our country itself would be under threat, and it was very nearly under threat,” Trump continued.
American intelligence agencies, however, believe Iran would not have had missiles capable of reaching the U.S. for another nine years, until 2035.
And sources confirmed to ABC News that Trump administration officials told congressional staff that U.S. intelligence did not suggest Iran was preparing to launch a preemptive strike against the United States interests.
The officials said there was more of a general threat in the region from Iran’s missiles and proxy forces, sources told ABC News.
Still, Trump argued Iran would have “soon” had the capability to reach the American homeland and that “this was our last best chance to strike.”
“The regime already had missiles capable of hitting Europe and our bases, both local and overseas, and would soon have had missiles capable of reaching our beautiful America,” Trump said.
Trump, in Monday’s remarks, laid out U.S. objectives for the military campaign.
“Our objectives are clear,” Trump said. “First, we’re destroying Iran’s missile capabilities, and you see that happening on an hourly basis, and their capacity to produce brand new ones and pretty good ones they make. Second, we’re annihilating their navy. We’ve knocked out already 10 ships. They’re at the bottom of the sea. Third, we’re ensuring that the world’s number one sponsor of terror can never obtain a nuclear weapon … And finally, we’re ensuring that the Iranian regime cannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside of their borders.”
Trump notably did not address the issue of regime change after speaking extensively on leadership change over the weekend, as he called for Iranians to rise up and take over the government.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth also shifted focus away from regime change in a press conference at the Pentagon earlier Monday, telling reporters the operation was not a “so-called regime-change war.”
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, was killed in an attack launched by Israel and the United States.
“The attack was so successful it knocked out most of the candidates,” Trump told ABC’s Karl. “It’s not going to be anybody that we were thinking of because they are all dead. Second or third place is dead.”
As for what’s next, Trump again promised not to drag the U.S. into prolonged foreign conflicts but said the operation will go on for as long as needed.
“We’re already substantially ahead of our time projections, but whatever the time is, it’s okay. Whatever it takes. We will always, and we have right from the beginning, we projected four to five weeks, but we have capability to go far longer than that. We’ll do it.”
“Somebody said today, they said, ‘Oh, well, the president wants to do it really quickly, after that, he’ll get bored.’ I don’t get bored,” Trump added. “There’s nothing boring about this.”
