Musk reposted an X post from the White House, which included a statement from Trump.

"'In light of this evening's events, I ask that all Americans recommit with their hearts in resolving our differences peacefully.' - President Donald J. Trump," the tweet read.

Musk became a particularly vocal Trump backer after the July 2024 assassination attempt at a Trump campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. In 2025, the two hit a relationship rough patch and traded some barbs, but they have been cordial at public events since.

White was a guest at the dinner and was in the room when chaos broke out.

"It was fucking awesome. I literally took every minute of it in. It was a pretty crazy, unique experience," White was seen saying in a video posted on X by MMAJunkie, part of USA Today's sports desk.

Thompson sent a memo to all CNN staffers after the incident, according to screenshots of the memo posted to X by Brian Stelter, the network's chief media analyst.

Thompson highlighted the CNN team's real-time response and on-the-ground reporting as the shooting unfolded.

"We know this was a frightening and disruptive situation for those in the room, and for your colleagues and loved ones watching live on CNN. Moments like this can stay with you in ways that aren't necessarily immediate or obvious," Thompson wrote.

"Please take care of yourselves and one another," he added.

Lowe is married to Weijia Jiang, the CBS journalist who chairs the White House Correspondents' Association. Jiang got her share of accolades from media peers and viewers alike for her poise under pressure — she was onstage next to Trump during the shooting, and took a front-row seat in the briefing room after.

"So proud of @weijia. She was on the stage less than an hour ago presiding over the abrupt end of the dinner and now she's in the front row of the White House briefing room waiting to for the President to speak," Lowe wrote.

The cofounders of the popular predictions market attended the event together.

"This was Luana and I's first White House Correspondents Dinner. The moment was scary, but the dinner until then was a great gathering of people from all sides," Mansour wrote on X.

"Grateful for law enforcement and that the President and everyone is safe," Mansour said, giving a shoutout to CBS's Jiang, too.

Lara thanked Mansour on X for pulling her under the table to keep her safe.

"If your co-founder isn't protecting you in a shooting situation, find another one," she wrote.

"Pretty scary that our most important leaders of the government were at risk today. President Trump, Vice President Pence, and House Speaker Johnson were all in that room," Zuberi wrote on X.

"From multiple attacks against our president to attacks against politicians around the country, to attacks on politicians and leadership around the world - these are abhorrent, and people everywhere should vehemently oppose and condemn them!" the tech investor added.

"I mean… I was definitely under the table. In a shooter situation, you want to be as low as possible," Y Combinator president and CEO, Garry Tan, wrote on X on Sunday.

"As I was under the table with other attendees, Marco Rubio pushed my chair out of the way making a fast exit with Secret Service. I now know we were in no serious danger but in that moment I wondered how many shooters there were and what would mean for 2,000 people in that room."

We started this experiment at different levels of proficiency.

Chong Ming had coded an app at a vibe-coding workshop. Cheryl, self-taught, had experimented with five vibe-coding platforms and made three web apps. Aditi was a true beginner.

We each set out to make an app. For Chong Ming, a writing companion in the shape of a cute creature. For Cheryl, a newsroom dashboard, a lite version of Asana to keep her team's work organized. And for Aditi, an app that acted like a newsroom photo coach, to deem whether a photo was good to publish.

Chong Ming: When I asked Base44 to plan the app, it responded with a few questions to clarify my prompt, with cute emojis. The plan it generated wasn't as detailed as what I've seen from Cursor, but it was user-friendly.

Lovable's plan was even simpler, pared down to a few bullet points. It was just as easy to use as Base44. Within minutes, it generated a web app similar to Base44's.

Cursor's interface seemed built for serious builders looking to ship real products. Its planning questions were more advanced and thoughtful, asking if I wanted an MVP build plan, a clickable prototype, or a full product spec — the kind of distinctions a software engineer would make.

Cheryl: I've always been one for the rule of cool, and Cursor looked really cool, with its all-black dashboard. But there was some charm in logging onto Lovable, with its girlypop, pink-heavy interface, and Base44 offered some cheerful vibes on its tangerine-colored interface, too.

Base44 and Lovable felt more like signing into a website and conversing with a chatbot. With Cursor and its MacBook app, I felt like I was hacking into the mainframe, with all its complicated scrolling lines of code.

Aditi: Off the bat, Cursor looked intimidating, and the option to sync GitHub when logging in made me think it wasn't a platform for a non-technical user.

Meanwhile, Base44 and Lovable were friendly and reassuring, with their gentle prompts: "What will you build next?" and "Ready to build, Aditi?"

Chong Ming: Base44 and Lovable were easy to use. The app plans were written in plain language for everyday users, and the interface was beginner-friendly. It was clear where to click if I needed help or wanted to tweak something.

Cursor was a different story. There were things I had to decipher on my own, like "frontend built with Next.js, React, and TypeScript."

Cheryl: I have never felt more like a dinosaur than when I first tried using Cursor. It was embarrassing having to look up basic terms to know what I was dealing with.

On Base44 and Lovable, I consistently typed in plain English and made the app edits accordingly. I felt like a wizard, watching the app preview morph and shift into view.

Aditi: I'd never tried vibe coding, so I asked AI for help understanding AI. I asked ChatGPT to help me refine my initial prompt into something I could plonk into the vibe coding platforms.

With Lovable and Base44, the learning was intuitive, and it felt like I was talking to ChatGPT. With Cursor, I was completely lost and had no idea where to start.

Chong Ming: Base44 built me a writing companion app with a cute egg. The layout felt bland, but it was a full-fledged, functional app created without using up all my credits.

Lovable's build was similar and didn't use all credits.

Both platforms could generate the app; the main variation was in aesthetics. I did appreciate that Base44 and Lovable let me edit the app directly in the interface.

The Cursor build process wasn't as hands-off. Unlike Base44 and Lovable, which ran start to finish, Cursor required me to approve commands and grant permissions to override folders on my computer. As it generated code, I could pause and review it, something that would likely appeal to developers who want control.

Cheryl: The best things in life are free, and vibe coding credits are one of them. On Base44 and Lovable, both platforms make it clear to users that they're cooking with limited credits, and that's fair — compute is costly. The mileage on each platform, however, was slightly different.

Lovable gave me good bones for the project up front and created something that was, aesthetically and functionally, closest to what I wanted. But it burned through more free credits than my Base44 project did, and some things still weren't working in the web app. I was stuck waiting for new credits to drop before I could make tweaks.

Base44 gave me something very close to a complete dashboard, but it lacked some key functionality — the option to delete tasks, or to drag and drop unscheduled tasks into the calendar frame. But that was ironed out within minutes with two additional message prompts.

Cursor's steeper learning curve and multi-step process made it far harder for me to work things out. After 10 minutes of Googling, I gave in and typed into the Cursor chat: "I'm confused. What do I do now? Give me a guide."

I was told to go to Supabase and make some adjustments to the settings, then try to ship it via a local server. At that point, I was coming up on half an hour of getting frustrated with the process.

Aditi: The development process was smooth sailing with Lovable and Base44. With one initial prompt and two additional tweaks, both platforms gave me usable apps that I thought would be handy newsroom tools.

I first tried Base44 and felt childlike wonder when it produced a clean, minimalist interface that let me drag a photo in and judge its quality.

After the initial merriment wore off, I started testing the features. One thing I had not realized was how specific my prompts needed to be, expecting it to anticipate my needs. For example, both platforms initially did not allow me to crop the image or adjust the framing, and instead automatically chose the subject for me. An easy second prompt brought the apps closer to my initial vision — although I quickly learned how to ration my prompts lest I run out of my daily free credits.

Lovable's interface had a neat little photo-scanning animation that I thought added visual interest to the otherwise simple interface.

Now for Cursor. I had to download the app on the MacBook, while the others could run in the browser. When I finally downloaded it and fed it my prompt, it ran lines of obscure code, asked for permissions to things I didn't understand, and made me lose motivation to build anything.

I eventually gave up on trying to make it work, but the app kept prodding me with pop-ups for permissions all day until I force-quit it.

I'll stick to my beginner-friendly platforms until further notice.

Chong Ming: Lovable and Base44 delivered working apps and refinements fast, but the quality didn't match Cursor. Cursor broke down what it added and made changes in detail, even if some of the jargon flew over my head.

When I refined the app, Cursor didn't just tweak surface-level things. It suggested enhancements such as adding extra animation frames or making the pet move faster. When I said I didn't want a simple egg, it flagged that a drawn mascot or pixel pet would require new assets — a level of clarity the others didn't offer.

By comparison, Lovable and Base44 suggested things like adding entrance animations, which felt more gimmicky than meaningful.

If I were building something serious, I'd go with Cursor, even if it takes more time and effort to get up to speed.

Cheryl: On both Lovable and Base44, I managed to build workable newsroom calendars and get them from first prompt to publishing within 10 minutes. Base44 gave me a complete, fully functional project I could immediately use and share with my team — and within the free credit range, too. The next day, I used my new set of credits on Lovable to make final tweaks, resulting in a publishable dashboard with all the functions I wanted.

On Cursor, however, I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong and why the code wasn't running as I intended. I never got my dashboard off the ground there. Cursor: It's not you, it's me.

If you have a nontechnical background, a clear vision for the app you want to build, but limited time to pick up a little more coding, a one-stop shop like Lovable and Base44 would be more your speed. If you do have more coding know-how, Cursor will give you access and oversight over the coding process within its free credit limit.

Aditi: As a colors-obsessed, minimalism-loving, non-technical person who just wants to build a simple app, here's my leaderboard: Lovable, Base44, Cursor.

The apps we tried are just a sampling of the vibe coding offerings out there. Other companies, like Emergent and Replit, also offer one-stop-shop platforms that take ideas from conception to shipping fast.

The barrier to entry is low, particularly with free credits on entry-level plans.

So if there was ever a time to try vibe-coding, it's now.