Donald Trump dodged a bullet today, literally. The 78-year-old had just started his speech during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania when the shots rang out and one of the bullets grazed his ear.
Several video clips showed how Trump was swarmed and covered up by his Secret Service agents moments after the shooting. But now, a show-motion video establishes how a simple head tilt saved Trump from the assassination attempt. It shows Trump tilting his head just seconds before the shot was fired.
Another video showed the moments behind the stage just before and after the shooting. Two agents standing behind the stage were seen rushing to the former president’s rescue.
He grabbed his right ear and brought his hand down to look at it before dropping to his knees behind the podium. He emerged about a minute later, his face streaked with blood. Fight! Fight! Fight!” he said, pumping his fist in the air.
The attack will likely reshape this year’s US presidential race while raising sharp questions about the security provided to the Republican candidate.
Trump left the Butler area under Secret Service protection and later arrived at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
He was “doing well” and appeared to have suffered no major injury besides a wound on his upper right ear, the Trump campaign said.
20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks has been identified by the FBI as the “subject involved” in what it termed an attempted assassination. He was a registered Republican, according to state voter records. He was shot dead by Secret Service agents after he opened fire from the roof of a building about 140 metres from the stage where Trump was speaking. An AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle was recovered near his body.
“I was shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear. “Much bleeding took place,” Trump said later on his Truth Social platform following the shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, about 30 miles (50 km) north of Pittsburgh.
The attack was the first shooting of a US president or major party candidate since the 1981 attempted assassination of Republican President Ronald Reagan.
The shooting occurred less than four months before the November 5 election, when Trump faces an election rematch with Democratic President Joe Biden. Most opinion polls including those by Reuters/Ipsos show the two locked in a close contest.
