Allison Jeanne Albro, 21, of Daytona Beach, was arrested early on Friday by the Volusia County Sheriff's Office Domestic Security Unit and the U.S. Secret Service — hours before President Trump's campaign rally in her city — after she posted a photo of herself on Instagram the night before saying she was going to the rally so she could shoot him.
The post went up on Thursday night: a selfie of Albro wearing clown makeup, captioned, in her own words: "Going to the Trump rally in my city tmr [sic] so I can shoot him with my glock! Wish me luck guys!"
Deputies and Secret Service agents went to her home and questioned her. According to Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood, Albro told investigators the post was a joke — that she did not have access to a Glock or any other weapon, and that she would never hurt anyone. That explanation exists only through law enforcement: Albro herself, her family and any attorney for her have made no public statement.
It did not keep her out of jail. "We are not going to tolerate threats to assassinate the president," Chitwood said, posting her Instagram photo and her booking photo for everyone to see. "Allison Albro, 21, Daytona Beach, is learning that the hard way. She said she was joking with this…" The sheriff said his office treats threats against the president seriously regardless of whether someone later describes them as humor, and he had a warning for anyone else: "I would strongly advise anyone else thinking of posting a 'joke' along these lines to think twice."
Albro is charged with two state felonies: written threats to kill or do bodily injury, which carries no bond, and unlawful use of a two-way communications device to commit a felony, with bond set at $2,500. No federal charges have been brought. She remains held at the Volusia County Jail; her first court appearance was scheduled for Friday afternoon, and no ruling from it has been reported.
The rally she named in the post went ahead as scheduled on Friday evening at the Ocean Center in Daytona Beach, with the president taking the stage at 7 p.m. to stump for Byron Donalds for governor and Senator Ashley Moody for re-election — while the woman who had threatened to shoot him sat in the county jail a short drive away.
What the case shows, in plain terms, is how a threat against the president is handled: it is investigated as a real plan until investigators clear it, and the "it was a joke" explanation is only heard after deputies and federal agents are already at the door. Albro says she had no gun and meant no harm — and she still spent rally day in a cell, held with no bond on the threats charge, facing two felony counts over a single caption. Every officer working that rally, and every person who attended it, had to treat her post as serious until it was proved otherwise. That cost lands immediately, long before any court decides whether she meant a word of it.
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