It’s hard to miss the massive American flag flying high on the Butler Farm Show ground on July 13 as waved through the site of the public meeting where former President Donald Trump is set to speak, just days before the important running mate choice and the Republican National Convention.
On July 13, the two of us, who had been tag-teaming coverage of Trump’s third presidential election for more than a year, went to what we thought would be a Trump rally in an open field in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, an important election. areas in important warring states. It ends with a gunman trying to take Trump’s life, and the death of a firefighter, Corey Comparatore.
We stood front and center in the press area at 6pm and Trump took the stage (an hour late, as it happened) and immediately knew something was wrong when the sound of fireworks went off to the left. There, gunman Thomas Crooks climbed into an unprotected building outside the security perimeter and fired several shots.
The hydraulic lift holding the massive stack of speakers was struck, smoke billowed out and the speakers slowly fell to the ground, and as we covered it (the ground twice), all we could think about was pulling out our phones and reaching for them. work Olivia recorded the voices of panicked journalists and participants gathered along the press riser and the bike rack that separated us, the screams of frightened children, and, heard only a few times, the voices of those around Corey Comperatore who asked for help.
Jake spoke with the emergency room Dr. James Sweetland, who ran to help Comperatore, and said that he heard gunshots and went to help, finding Comperatore “stuck between the benches” before trying to save his life.
We were both surprised that the crowd turned around moments after Trump’s motorcade left Butler, with one man yelling “It’s your fault!”
What used to be a typical Trump rally is no longer typical.
Eighty-four days later Trump is backand also two people, took the same route from downtown Pittsburgh, parked in the same location, and endured the same heat without shade in the press pen together with fellow journalists who, like us and the former president, chose to return and face our trauma .
The stage was set up in the same location, with the same American flag in front of Trump and the crowd behind him that day.
But for everything that was the same day, there was a striking difference. The building where the gunman had climbed up, crawled right, and finally fired fatal shots, completely obstructed from the view of the crowd by a tractor trailer. Several sniper teams were stationed throughout the rally site. This may be the largest crowd we’ve seen at a Trump rally.
And we are not the same people. Witnessing the events of July 13 took away our sense of security in our work, and its effects continue to affect us. There was a shocking moment when the speaker on the stage stopped while the crowd shouted “medical” for the unconscious woman. We were frozen in fear of hearing the same words shouted in a few seconds after the attempt to kill Trump, as people shouted for medica to take care of Comperatore.
But like July 13th, we have to work. As with the tens of thousands who chose to return, there was a sense of unfinished business at this fairground. We continued to Milwaukee and the Republican National Convention to cover Trump’s first public appearance since Butler, but we knew we had to come back here, no matter how painful it was to be back in Pittsburgh, head north on Route 79 and pull over. off on the Butler Farm Show, and job done: for both of us, for CBS News, for the country.
Unlike other speakers on stage Saturday who championed Trump’s words “fight, fight, fight,” Sweetland went out of his way to call himself a former Democrat and asked the crowd to reach out and find five Democrats they could find. sameness.
“Democrats are like teenagers,” Sweetland said. “You’d think they weren’t listening, but they were.”
Eight or four days later, the entire race had changed, and so had we.
