Two military personnel have been shot near the White House in Washington DC.

A suspect has been taken into custody and the area secured, police said.

The White House was placed into lockdown, while US President Donald Trump is away in Florida.

Mr Trump posted on his Truth Social platform to say the two National Guard members had been “critically wounded”, adding that the “animal” that shot them “is also severely wounded, but regardless, will pay a very steep price”.

Washington DC shooting latest updates

Both guardsmen were shot in the head, according to Sky’s US partner network, NBC News, quoting an official and a senior official directly briefed on the investigation.

The shooting will be investigated by the FBI as a possible act of terror, two senior US law enforcement officials told NBC.

The suspect, who used a handgun in the attack, has been initially identified as an Afghan national, the officials said.

But investigators are still trying to confirm all of the individual’s details.

West Virginia’s governor initially said both victims were members of his state’s National Guard and had died from their injuries – but later posted to say there were “conflicting reports about the condition of our two Guard members”.

Patrick Morrisey had said: “These brave West Virginians lost their lives in the service of their country.”

FBI director Kash Patel said two National Guard members were “brazenly attacked in a horrendous act of violence”.

At a news conference he clarified they were in a “critical condition”.

Jeff Carroll, chief of the metropolitan police department in the area, said the attack began at 2.15pm local time (7.15pm in the UK) while National Guard members were on “high visibility patrols in the area”.

He said: “A suspect came around the corner, raised his arm with a firearm and discharged it at the National Guard.

“The National Guard members were… able to – after some back and forth – able to subdue the individual and bring them into custody.”

Washington DC mayor Muriel Bowser called the attack a “targeted shooting”.

Social media footage showed first responders attempting CPR on one of the soldiers as they treated the other on a pavement covered in glass.

Nearby other officers could be seen restraining an individual on the ground.

The scene has been cordoned off by police tape, while agents from the US Secret Service and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on the scene, as National Guard troops stood sentry nearby. The FBI was also on the scene, the agency’s director said.

The Joint DC Task Force confirmed it was responding to an incident in the vicinity of the White House.

The DC Police Department posted on X: “Critical Incident: MPD is on the scene of a shooting at 17th and I Street, NW. Please avoid the area.”

In an update, the force said: “The scene is secured. One suspect is in custody.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “The White House is aware and actively monitoring this tragic situation.

“The president has been briefed.”

Mr Trump was at his resort in Palm Beach ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, while US vice president JD Vance was in Kentucky.

US defence secretary Pete Hegseth said Mr Trump had asked for 500 more troops to be deployed to Washington DC after the shooting.

Flights arriving at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport were temporarily halted due to its proximity to the scene of the shooting, the US Federal Aviation Administration said.

Hundreds of National Guard members have been patrolling the nation’s capital after Mr Trump issued an emergency order in August, which federalised the local police force and sent in the guard from eight states and the District of Columbia.

Rachel Reeves has said she recognises she is “asking ordinary people to pay a little bit more” after she announced £26bn worth of tax rises in her budget – including extending the freeze on personal income thresholds.

However, the chancellor also told Sky News political editor Beth Rigby that she had “managed to keep that contribution as low as I possibly can by closing loopholes and asking those with the broadest shoulders to pay more”.

The package contains a new “mansion tax” on properties worth over £2m, while people paying into their pension pot under salary sacrifice schemes will face national insurance on contributions above £2,000.

In a win for Labour MPs, the two-child benefit cap will be scrapped from April, costing £3bn by 2029/30.

Spending is set to rise by £11bn overall by this date, with a big chunk of this money funding policy U-turns on welfare.

The chancellor also announced:

• New taxes on the gambling industry to raise more than £1bn;

• A new mileage tax for electric vehicles from April 2028;

• The amount you can save in a tax-free cash ISA has been slashed from £20,000 to £12,000, except for over 65s;

• The 5p cut in fuel duty will remain in place until September 2026, when it will be reversed through a staggered approach.

Read More: The budget key points at a glance

The measures, which were published by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) ahead of time in an unprecedented blunder, will take the UK’s tax burden to an all-time high of 38% of GDP in 2030-31, the fiscal watchdog said.

Ms Reeves blamed Brexit and the Tories’ legacy, saying her choices would lead to a “fairer, stronger, more secure Britain”.

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She told Rigby she acknowledged the changes “have a cost for working people”, but twice refused to say she had broken Labour’s manifesto promise not to increase income tax, national insurance and VAT.

But Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said the budget was a “total humiliation”, given the chancellor promised that her £40bn tax raising budget last year would be a once-in a parliament event.

Ms Badenoch said: “Last year we had the horrors of the Halloween Budget. This year it’s the Nightmare Before Christmas. And as for her, she’s the unwelcome Christmas guest, 10 minutes through the door and and she’s eaten all the Quality Street.”

What does the freeze on income tax thresholds mean?

The freeze on tax thresholds, introduced by the Conservatives in 2021, was due to end by 2028.

Ms Reeves has extended it for another three years, in a move which will raise an estimated £8bn for the exchequer in 2029-2030 by dragging some 1.7 million people into a higher tax band.

The chancellor previously said she would not freeze thresholds as it would “hurt working people”.

However she was left with a fresh fiscal blackhole of around £30bn after the OBR downgraded its growth forecasts for the UK economy in each year from 2026 to 2029.

The “mansion tax” will raise £0.4bn in 2029-30, while charging national insurance on salary-sacrificed pension contributions, to take effect from 2029, is estimated to raise £4.7bn, the OBR said.

A further £2.1bn will be raised through increasing tax rates on dividends, property and savings income by two percentage points.

The measures mean the amount of headroom the government has against the chancellor’s day-to-day spending rule that prevents her from borrowing will widen to £21.7bn, almost £12bn more than March.

Package of small tax rises

Read More: What the budget means for your money

Some policies announced today have previously been confirmed by the government, including a “milkshake tax”, a rise in the national minimum wage, the freezing of rail fares and powers for local mayors to impose a tourism tax.

Further spending announcements include free training for apprentices under 25 at small and medium-sized companies, £5m for secondary school libraries and £18m to improve playgrounds in England.

There have also been spending cuts, including a cut to VAT discount for ride-hailing apps like Uber – something critics have branded a “taxi tax” – while a scheme to help disabled people with the cost of a car will no longer offer “luxury vehicles”.

The budget was seen as a big test for Sir Keir Starmer, who has faced threats of a leadership challenge if Labour’s polling doesn’t improve.

Labour MPs on side – for now

Patrick Hurley, the Labour MP for Southport, told Sky News the package was “much stronger than I was expecting”.

He added: “Very good news on child poverty, gambling taxes and mansion taxes. A lot done, and a lot still to do after 14 years of declining living standards under a succession of dreadful Tory PMs. But I’ve left the Chamber in a much happier mood than when I walked in at 11.30.”

John McDonnell, A veteran left wing MP within Labour’s Socialist Campaign Group (SCG), said removing the two-child cap was a “major win” for colleagues who had pushed for the move.

However he said Ms Reeves’ tax increases on wealth don’t go far enough, with the freeze on tax thresholds offsetting other measures aimed at increasing disposable income and resulting in living standards remaining “at a standstill”.

In a message to the SCG he said: “Despite the policy changes we have secured today on child poverty and taxation of wealth it does frustratingly point to the last 18 months being wasted when with our majority we could have done so much more to address the poverty and inequality that scars our community and put money in people’s pockets to drive economic growth.”

The Los Angeles Angels and third baseman Anthony Rendon are in talks about buying out the final year of his contract, potentially bringing a resolution to the seven-year, $245 million deal that did not come close to paying dividends for the team, a source told ESPN on Wednesday.

Rendon, who spent the entire 2025 season recovering from hip surgery, is expected to retire, a source said.

The 35-year-old is owed $38 million in 2026. A potential buyout of that remaining money has not been finalized, and situations like this can often get complicated, but the expectation is that Rendon will defer at least part of that money, giving the team more financial flexibility to address needs this offseason.

The Angels made Rendon the game’s highest-paid third baseman in December 2019, after watching him star for the then-World Series champion Washington Nationals. If the Angels and Rendon’s agent, Scott Boras, are able to finalize a buyout, he will end up playing in just a quarter of the Angels’ games over the life of that deal, compiling 3.7 FanGraphs wins above replacement (fWAR).

A first-round pick out of Rice University in 2011, Rendon established himself as one of the game’s best all-around players with an emerging corps in Washington. He was a hitting savant and a gifted defender, and from 2016 to 2019 only nine position players put up more fWAR.

Rendon slashed .299/.384/.528 in that four-year stretch. His last season with the Nationals saw him finish third in National League MVP voting after putting up a career-high 1.010 OPS along with 34 home runs and a major-league-leading 126 RBIs while making his star turn in a postseason run that ended with the franchise’s first title.

With the spotlight cast onto him, Rendon’s publicly stated limited interest in baseball — he admitted often that it’s not his foremost priority, that it’s merely a job, and that he doesn’t care about the accolades or attention — became an endearing part of his personality. As the years went on, it became a referendum on his lack of productivity.

Rendon looked very much like his usual self during a 2020 season that was interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic. It proved to be the last time the Angels experienced anything close to Rendon’s prime. Over the next four years, he slashed just .231/.329/.336 while appearing in 205 of a potential 648 games. Injuries to his left groin, left knee, left hamstring, left shin, left oblique, lower back, both wrists and both hips sent him to the injured list.

The final blow came Feb. 12, 2025, when the Angels announced at the start of spring training that Rendon would undergo hip surgery and miss the season. Rendon spent the entire season away from the team, mostly rehabbing near his home in Houston. His last home run with the team occurred July 1, 2023. He never played in more than 58 games in a season.

Rendon’s albatross contract coincided with Mike Trout suffering a similar spate of bad injury luck. The unavailability of those two players — by far the team’s highest paid — coupled with an overall lack of depth throughout the roster, only furthered the Angels’ slide despite the emergence of Shohei Ohtani as a two-way phenomenon.

The Angels have not made the playoffs since 2014 and have not won a playoff game since 2009. The 2025 season marked their 10th in a row with a below-.500 record. Kurt Suzuki, Rendon’s teammate on the 2019 Nationals, has since been named the Angels’ manager — the team’s sixth in eight years.

Soon, at least, they can move on at third base.