News DeskMultiple accounts on X shared images on Sunday claiming to show White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting suspect Cole Tomas Allen with his alleged Indian wife and her Indian passport . The images gained significant traction, with individual posts receiving 1.2 million, 406,000, and 175,000 views. However, a detailed review shows that the visuals are AI‑generated and the claim is false.
The shooting occurred on Saturday at the hotel hosting the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.
A lone gunman fired shots, prompting security to evacuate President Donald Trump and senior officials before the suspect was detained. Law enforcement identified the suspect as Cole Tomas Allen, a 31‑year‑old resident of Torrance, California, who appears from online profiles to be a Caltech graduate and part‑time teacher.
The first viral post came from an account that had previously shared anti‑India content. It posted two images showing Allen with a woman identified as “Priyanka Rao” and an Indian passport. Similar posts followed, including several that repeated the claim without mentioning nationality. Additional users shared the same visuals in identical contexts, as seen here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here (all linked in the original article), collectively adding 151,000 more views.
A fact‑check was initiated due to the virality of the posts. A keyword search found no credible reporting from American or international media indicating that Allen had an Indian wife. U.S. authorities have not provided any such information.
Instead, outlets such as NBC, the Los Angeles Times, and the News Tribune reported that Allen lived with his parents. His manifesto, according to these reports, made no reference to a spouse or relationship.
A reverse image search for the woman in the viral photo produced no matches. Visual comparison also revealed inconsistencies between Allen’s arrest photo and the viral portrait. The arrest image shows a mole under his right eye, which is missing in the viral image. The nose structure also differs.
The alleged Indian passport also contained multiple errors:
- “Nationality” field incorrectly listed “Cole Thomas Allen” instead of a country.
- The father’s name field repeated the same name, implying the person was both nationality and parent.
- The shooter’s name was misspelled (“Thomas” instead of “Tomas”).
- The “Name of Spouse” field repeated the passport holder’s name.
- The Hindi text for “Date of Issue” was nonsensical.
- The Machine Readable Zone (MRZ) contained incorrect date formats, misaligned digits, and used “IN” instead of the correct “IND” country code.
- Security features such as holograms, microprinting, and a proper ghost image were missing.
The viral images claiming to show Cole Tomas Allen with an Indian wife and her passport are AI‑generated. There is no evidence that Allen was married, and the passport shown in the posts is fabricated.
