Donald Trump returned to the site where he was nearly assassinated this summer, but his brush with death doesn’t appear to have changed him in the slightest.
On Saturday evening, Trump returned to Butler, Pennsylvania — walking out to a live rendition of “God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood — and opened with the words “as I was saying,” referencing the fact that his previous rally at the site ended abruptly when a gunman fired an AR-15 toward the stage, grazing his ear and killing one attendee and injuring two others.
Rather than giving the former president a new perspective on the political temperature in the country, Trump’s rhetoric appears to have become more volatile; during the rally, he suggested that his political opponents “maybe tried to kill me.”
“Over the past eight years, those who want to stop us from achieving this future have slandered me, impeached me, indicted m, tried to throw me off the ballot, and who knows, maybe even tried to kill me,” he said. “But I never stopped fighting for you, and I never will.”
His son, Eric, made a similar claim earlier in the night.
The younger Trump told the crowd that “they” tried to “get my father everyday” since he launched his first campaign for the White House, and then said “they tried to kill him.”
Trump took a moment to recognize the three men who were shot alongside him during the July 13 assassination attempt. He noted David Dutch and James Copenhaver, who could not attend the rally because he was undergoing a surgery related to his wounds.
He then recognized Corey Comperatore, who was fatally shot at the July event. Trump called for a moment of silence during which bells tolled. An opera performer then began singing “Ave Maria.”
The rally was briefly stalled when someone in the audience experienced a medical issue. Trump stopped speaking and told first responders to take their time. During the downtime, the audience chanted “God bless Trump” and began singing the national anthem.
Trump hit his usual points — he claimed that Democrats were trying to weaponize the government through lawsuits to take him down, and claimed that President Joe Biden’s administration is paying for “sex change operations” for “illegal immigrants in holding bins.”
He then brought Elon Musk to the stage, calling him the man who “saved free speech” in the US.
Musk — who endorsed Trump immediately after the shooting, then launched a political action committee to financially support him — falsely claimed that Democrats were trying to strip Americans of their right to bear arms, their free speech, and their voting rights before making the baseless claim that Harris would eliminate elections in the US.
“If [Republicans] don’t vote, this will be the last election,” Musk said. “That is my prediction.”
Trump also blamed Biden and Harris for migrant children he said were “dead, in slavery, or just plain missing” — radically misrepresenting a government watchdog report about the status of children who crossed the US-Mexico border.
He also suggested that he could once again contest the results of the presidential election with spurious claims of fraud as he invoked the phrase “stop the steal.”
“Stop the steal. Because we have a lot of votes, we have plenty of votes,” Trump said.
Apart from the memorial at the start of the rally and the appearance by Musk, the rally largely resembled a typical Trump rally, despite the fact that he was nearly killed in Butler 12 weeks ago.
On July 13, would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, fired several shots at Trump. Crooks had no clear political leanings and reportedly idolized mass shooters, according to law enforcement officials.
Crooks fired eight shots, killing one man in the audience, critically injuring two others, and nicking Trump’s ear.
Immediately after he was shot, Trump — surrounded by Secret Service members — popped back up and pumped his fist in the air and yelled “fight.” The moment was captured by photographers and became a major fundraising tool for Trump in the wake of the event.
Crooks was fatally shot by a Secret Service counter sniper moments after Crooks fired his weapon.
Shortly after the attempted assassination, Trump’s joint fundraising committee sent an email and text out to supporters with the message “I am Donald J Trump and I will NEVER SURRENDER.” The messages included links for donations.
Merchandise — especially T-shirts — bearing the image became popular with online retailers and have been common place among vendors setting up outside Trump rallies.
The political landscape shifted almost immediately.
Days after the shooting, Trump formally accepted the Republican nomination for president. But days later, President Biden made the historic decision to drop out of the race and instead back Harris for president, reinvigorating Democrats after Biden’s heavily criticised second debate performance against Trump.
Republicans were confident that the attempted assassination would clear the way for a landslide victory in November, but there was no evidence that the shooting actually increased support.
Trump was reportedly targeted a second time on Sunday, September 15, while he was golfing at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida. Secret Service agents spotted a man identified as Ryan Wesley Routh with a rifle approximately 400 yards from Trump.
Routh was arrested and charged with attempting to assassinate Trump, as well as assaulting a federal officer and three other weapons violations. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. If convicted, he could spend the rest of his life in prison.