What a trauma. What is inevitable.
The assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump was horrific. This is an attack on everything America stands for, an attack on democracy itself.
One attendee, a man who was reportedly sitting behind Trump, was shot in the head and killed. Two other participants were critically injured.
A witness told NBC News that he had taken time off work to come to Saturday’s event in Pennsylvania. He had never attended a political rally, he said. He thought it would be fun.
Trump pumped his fists as he was surrounded by secret service agents
In relation to what was recently seen, a man was shot dead before his eyes and the former president was almost killed, he said he was not sure of the details.
‘Time dilates,’ he said.
Time dilates, indeed. So, now, it’s this election.
A Trump supporter named Tracy spoke for us all.
‘Why,’ he asked, ‘is this happening in our country today?’
America is fed up. This presidential election cycle has felt heavier than the last, and the one before that. Now, the feeling is unbearable.
Trump supporters took cover as gunfire rang out at a Pennsylvania campaign rally
We have been whipsawed, in the past few weeks, from disbelief to shame to shock and sadness.
This is the kind of terror and violence this nation needs to deal with.
We saw Trump wince, touch his ear, see the blood, then duck and cover before the Secret Service swarmed him.
After the shooter was reported dead, security agents began picking up Trump, who could be heard saying, ‘Let me get my shoes’ – suggesting he was surrounded by force until his shoes were gone.
After standing up, Trump faced the crowd, blood on the right side of his face, and pumped his fist in the air.
‘Fight!’ shouted to the crowd. ‘Fight! war!’
It’s pure Donald Trump: Defiance and iconography. His statement, released on Truth Social just a few hours later – while he was still in the hospital – was perfect.
He thanked the Secret Service and law enforcement before speaking not about himself, but about other victims of the shooter.
‘Most importantly,’ Trump wrote, ‘I want to express my condolences to the families of the people at the rally who died, and also to the families of the others who were seriously injured. It is amazing that such an act can happen in our country.’
It’s also remarkable that President Biden took nearly two hours to make a statement – unlike his previous tweets, or one-line press releases. Perhaps he sleeps at the beach house.
When Biden spoke, roused in Rehoboth Beach, it was to decry the ‘politics of violence’. His words were completely impersonal.
This is a small club, former US presidents are still alive. You’d think, despite their personal animosity, that trying to assassinate one of them would elicit a word from our current president, not boilerplate campaign trash — dross that might be indecent. counterfactual.
“The idea that there is this kind of political violence in America is just unheard of,” he said.
That? Sitting US presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy were killed by assassins. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan all survived assassination attempts. It’s all very well-heard.
‘Look,’ Biden continued. ‘There is no place in America for this kind of violence … That’s why we need to unite this country.’
There is no urgency, no human compassion, or time for detente.
Trump supporter Tracy asked: ‘Why is this happening in our country today?’
Same with former president Barack Obama, who himself was a target who reportedly wore a bulletproof suit to his 2009 inauguration.
Obama also took hours to express his condolences, or what he did, at X.
‘There is no place for political violence in our democracy,’ he wrote. ‘Although we do not know exactly what happened, we should all be relieved that former President Trump is not seriously ill, and use this time to recommit ourselves to civility and respect in our politics.’
wow He is considered the best orator in modern American politics. They can do better.
How galling to be taught about ‘uniting the country’ and ‘uniting ourselves for decency’ by two US presidents who could not, or did not, respond to this tragedy quickly, and with gritted teeth say that they are glad Trump was not seriously injured.
This election will not get any more civilians; away from it.
But America has had worse. We survived the Civil War, Pearl Harbor, the assassinations of JFK, Martin Luther King, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in quick succession.
We survived 9/11, the pandemic, and — despite daily warnings from the left — Trump’s first term.
We will deal with this as well. And we will be stronger.
