Lawyers for Cole Tomas Allen, the 31-year-old California man accused of opening fire outside the White House Correspondents' Association dinner on April 25, want U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro removed from the case. Their argument: she was inside the Washington Hilton ballroom that night and is both a potential witness and a potential victim. Pirro's answer has been unequivocal, she is not going anywhere.
The defense filed its disqualification motion on May 7, Newsweek reported, targeting not just Pirro but also acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who was likewise present at the dinner. During Allen's arraignment on Monday, U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden pressed the defense to clarify the scope of its request and gave prosecutors until May 22 to respond in writing, including whether the government considers Pirro and Blanche victims in the case.
Allen pleaded not guilty to all charges, including attempted assassination, assaulting a federal officer with a deadly weapon, and two firearm counts. He faces a maximum of life in prison on the assassination charge alone. The question now is whether the legal maneuvering over who prosecutes the case will hand him an appellate lifeline he does not deserve.
The May 7 filing leans on two pillars. First, Allen's lawyers contend that Pirro and Blanche are witnesses and potential victims of the very crime they are prosecuting. The filing points to Pirro's social media activity within roughly thirty minutes of the shooting, including a video in which she said, "I've been taken out of the ballroom after the sounds of shots fired." The defense argues she has made "several media appearances" since April 25 referencing her status as a potential victim.
Second, the filing raises Pirro's personal relationship with President Trump, calling it "a separate but necessary basis for disqualification" and claiming she has been friends with Trump "for decades." The Washington Examiner reported that the motion asked pointedly: "How can the American justice system permit a victim to prosecute a criminal defendant in a case involving them? Or even, how can one of the victim's closest friends prosecute the alleged perpetrator of the offense?"
Defense attorney Eugene Ohm signaled the team would likely push to disqualify Pirro's entire office, though he acknowledged that an effort to disqualify the full Department of Justice would be unlikely.
Pirro has not wavered. Asked earlier this month whether she plans to recuse herself, she answered flatly: "Absolutely not."
In a statement to Newsweek, she said her office would "evaluate the motion and respond in court." But she left no ambiguity about her view of the defense argument:
"There is no way. That would be like telling witnesses you can't testify at the trial because you were there. The truth is that there were 2,500 of us who were there, and my ability to prosecute this case has nothing to do with my being there."
She added a broader warning about the case itself: "We will not tolerate people who come to the District of Columbia to engage in antidemocratic acts of political violence; and we will prosecute all such acts to the fullest extent of the law."
Pirro has been one of the most visible federal prosecutors in the country in recent months. Her office pushed prosecutors on a separate high-profile matter involving Democratic lawmakers, and she has drawn both praise and criticism for her willingness to take on politically sensitive cases.
The split among legal commentators tracks a familiar fault line: the letter of the law versus the optics of the prosecution.
Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Newsweek there is "little to no chance" that Pirro will actually be disqualified. His reasoning was direct: Allen never breached the perimeter, Pirro may not have witnessed the shooting itself, and she has not been named as a victim in the indictment. "There's really no legal basis," Rahmani said, calling the motion "part of the strategy of litigation."
But Rahmani also acknowledged the tactical logic behind the defense play:
"If you're a good defense lawyer, you raise these motions to create potential appellate issues. That's what all good defense lawyers do. If you're the prosecution, you're not just thinking about a trial verdict, but you're thinking of a verdict that's going to withstand appeal."
That concern, appeal-proofing the verdict, is precisely where critics of Pirro's refusal to step aside find their footing. Legal analyst Elie Honig told CNN that Pirro and Blanche are "probably intended victims" and warned that staying on the case hands Allen a weapon he can use later.
"There are dozens, hundreds of other prosecutors in DOJ more than capable of trying this case and of supervising this case. And on the flip side, you take away an appeals issue. If they stay on this case, Pirro and Blanche, they are handing this individual where the proof of his guilt seems to be overwhelming, an issue to raise on appeal."
Honig went further, noting that "there are federal courts of appeals in this country that have thrown out guilty verdicts because prosecutors refuse to recuse when they should have recused."
The DOJ has navigated other politically charged prosecutorial questions in recent months. The department moved to close a separate high-profile probe after a court found the evidence insufficient, underscoring the risks of overreach in sensitive cases.
Former federal prosecutor Gene Rossi landed between the two camps, acknowledging Pirro's legal right to stay but urging her not to. He told Newsweek that even without an actual conflict, the appearance of one should be enough.
"Jeanine Pirro, in a light most favorable to her, is both a witness and a victim to this alleged crime. There could be an actual conflict, but there surely is an appearance problem."
Rossi's advice was blunt: "The US attorney is creating an issue that she could easily get rid of if she errs on the side of caution and acts purer than Caesar's wife. It's as simple as that."
Former federal prosecutor Shanlon Wu offered a more measured take, telling Newsweek the application "depends heavily upon the discretion of the officials and the court." He suggested the issue could give the defense potential grounds for appeal but would not necessarily complicate a jury verdict.
The underlying facts of the prosecution appear strong. Allen, a Caltech graduate who earned a master's degree in computer science from Cal State Dominguez Hills in 2025, is accused of opening fire during the WHCA dinner at the Washington Hilton on April 25. He was subdued by law enforcement before reaching the ballroom, where President Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and other senior government officials were gathered.
A Secret Service officer was struck in the chest, but a protective vest stopped the bullet. No one else was injured. Allen allegedly carried a shotgun, six knives, a pistol, and rounds of ammunition and shotgun cartridges.
Authorities said Allen sent a message to family members minutes before attempting to breach the dinner. In it, he wrote:
"Oh and if anyone is curious is how doing something like feels: it's awful. I want to throw up; I want to cry for all the things I wanted to do and never will, for all the people whose trust this betrays; I experience rage thinking about everything this administration has done."
Allen was placed on suicide watch in the days following the shooting. He had been employed by the tutoring company C2 Education as recently as December 2024, when he was honored as "Teacher of the Month" at its Torrance location.
The New York Post reported that the defense also cited Pirro's public criticism of a judge in the case as evidence of her personal investment, with Allen's lawyers writing that her "emotional response was inflammatory, inappropriate, and inaccurate," showing "the depths of her personal interest in this case." A former federal prosecutor quoted by the Post described the recusal bid as a "Hail Mary" that was "highly unlikely" to succeed.
Defense attorney Ohm called it "wholly inappropriate" for Pirro or Blanche to be "making the primary prosecutorial decisions in the case." That framing is self-serving, defense lawyers are paid to create problems for the prosecution. But the legal analysts raising the appeal question are not working for Allen. They are pointing to a procedural vulnerability that the government can eliminate without sacrificing the case.
Judge McFadden's order, giving prosecutors until May 22 to respond and to clarify whether Pirro and Blanche are considered victims, suggests the court takes the question seriously enough to want it answered on the record. The broader tension between Pirro's office and the federal judiciary has surfaced in other contexts as well, including a recent dispute over grand jury procedures that drew sharp judicial pushback.
Pirro's argument has a common-sense appeal: 2,500 people attended the dinner, and barring every attendee from involvement in the prosecution would be absurd. But Pirro is not just any attendee. She is the chief federal prosecutor in the District of Columbia, she posted about the incident on social media within half an hour, and her relationship with the president, the alleged target, is well documented.
None of that means she has an actual conflict. It does mean the defense has enough material to build an appellate argument. And in a case where the evidence of guilt appears, by multiple analysts' accounts, to be strong, the last thing the government should want is a procedural foothold for a man accused of trying to assassinate the President of the United States.
The administration has shown it can deliver results ahead of schedule when it wants to. Ensuring a clean, appeal-proof conviction of Cole Tomas Allen should be at the top of that list.
The Department of Justice has hundreds of capable prosecutors. The case against Allen does not need Jeanine Pirro's name on it, it needs a guilty verdict that sticks.