Prosecutors have revealed details from Cole Allen’s cross-country Amtrak journey, offering a glimpse into his mindset in the days leading up to his alleged assassination attempt on President Donald Trump. The court filing highlights observations and thoughts Allen recorded on his phone during the trip from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C.
Observations on the Journey
Allen boarded a one-way Amtrak train on April 21, with a stop in Chicago for a train change. His phone notes, however, did not focus on his alleged plot. Instead, they captured his observations of the American landscape. “The southwest desert in spring Distant wind turbines looming like snowy mountains across the hazy NM desert,” he noted while traveling through the Southwest. Describing Chicago, he wrote, “Chicago is cool; kinda like an Iowa small town was scaled up to LA size.” He also commented on the scenery in Pennsylvania, noting, “the woods are awesome (look like vast fairy lands filled with tiny trickling creeks in spring apparently.”
Manifesto and Expert Analysis
Upon arriving in Washington, D.C. on April 24, Allen spent approximately 30 hours in the city before allegedly initiating his attack. Surveillance footage from the Washington Hilton hotel showed him pacing hallways and briefly entering the fitness center. Minutes before the incident, Allen reportedly sent a pre-scheduled email to family and friends explaining his actions. In this communication, he apologized profusely to those he knew and expressed a desire to be seen as a savior of the oppressed, though he never explicitly stated he was willing to die for his cause.
Jonny Grusing, a former FBI special agent and behavioral analyst, reviewed Allen’s notes and manifesto. Grusing described Allen’s mindset as “scattered” and suggested narcissistic and psychopathic tendencies. “His flippancy of what he was talking about in the train or writing about, coincides with what he writes in his manifesto as, ‘hello everybody, so I may have given a lot of people a surprise today,'” Grusing stated. “I mean, that’s not someone who’s singularly focused on a grievance.” Grusing further elaborated that Allen’s apologies to people he encountered on the train, coupled with his desire to become a “national name,” indicated a conflicted individual rather than someone singularly focused on a mission.
