A bystander who was struck by gunfire after a man fired on a checkpoint outside the White House and was fatally shot by US Secret Service officers remains in serious but stable condition.

The Secret Service said the bystander, who has not been identified, suffered a gunshot wound described as not life-threatening.

It was not clear how he was shot.

Authorities have released few additional details about the shooting early on Saturday night (local time). Multiple US outlets have shared footages of journalists ducking for cover or being ushered to safety as shots rang out while they were reporting from outside the White House.

The District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department said the suspect, identified as 21-year-old Nasire Best, started shooting toward a White House security checkpoint when Secret Service officers returned fire.

Best, of Dundalk, Maryland, was later pronounced dead at a hospital.

US President Donald Trump was in the White House at the time.

It was the third shooting near Trump in the past month, after a man stormed the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in April armed with guns and knives, and Secret Service officers shot and wounded a man who fired at them earlier in May near the Washington Monument.

In a Truth Social post, Trump said the suspect in Saturday’s shooting had a “possible obsession with our Country’s most cherished structure”.

He also used the latest incident to further promote the ballroom he is seeking to build on the site of the White House’s former East Wing, saying the shooting “goes to show how important it is, for all future Presidents, to get, what will be, the most safe and secure space of its kind ever built in Washington, DC”.

Trump is asking Congress for $US1 billion ($A1.4 billion) for security additions for the White House campus, including the ballroom.

Best had a previous run-in with law enforcement near the White House, according to District of Columbia court records.

He was arrested last July for attempting to enter White House grounds near a different checkpoint. He failed to heed officers’ commands to stop, claimed to be Jesus Christ and said he wanted to be arrested.

Best was a track and field athlete at Dundalk High School, from which he graduated in 2023.

A woman who identified herself as Best’s mother told The Washington Post she learned about the shooting on social media and was in disbelief. She said her son “was never violent, regardless of what people are posting”.

-AAP