Hundreds of people in attendance at a Faith and Freedom Coalition Event in Washington D.C. were evacuated from the Omni Shoreham Hotel on Friday afternoon because of a "credible threat."
A suspicious package was discovered near the ballroom around 1 p.m., Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman Aquita Brown told the Associated Press. The threat was directed at the hotel's main ballroom. where attendees were waiting for former New York Gov. George Pataki to speak, according to NBC News.
"We don't want anything to happen to anybody in this room," Ralph Reed, the chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, told the packed main ballroom before security arrived to sweep the area.
A large majority of the attendees at the event are evangelical Christians, according to the AP.
Multiple Republicans hoping to land on the party's ticket for the 2016 presidential ticket passed through the conference, including including New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.
The Faith and Freedom Coalition Conference is a three-day event that is scheduled to conclude tomorrow.
