Trump Is Safe After Assassination Attempt; Suspected Gunman Is Dead (2024)

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Here’s the latest.

Mr. Trump was escorted off the stage bleeding from around his ear, and taken to a hospital. He later said on social media that a bullet had pierced the upper part of his right ear.

President Biden gave a brief televised statement after the incident, condemning the violence as “sick.” The White House later said the president had spoken to Mr. Trump.

Here’s what to know:

• Two videos posted on social media and verified by The New York Times appeared to show the suspected shooter lying motionless on the roof of a small building roughly 400 feet north of the stage where former President Donald J. Trump was speaking. Here’s a map of the site.

• Mr. Trump had been showing supporters a chart of numbers about border crossings just minutes into his speech when shots rang out in two bursts. Read firsthand accounts from our reporter and photographer.

• A spokesman for the Secret Service said that the suspected shooter fired “multiple shots toward the stage” and was on “an elevated position” outside the rally venue. The Secret Service and other law enforcement agencies have not yet publicly confirmed that Mr. Trump was shot in the ear, saying only that shots were fired and that the former president was “safe.”

• Two law enforcement officials said that authorities recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle from a deceased man they believe was the gunman. People who attend Mr. Trump’s campaign rallies are subject to security screenings, and their belongings are typically searched for weapons.

• After the shooting, Mr. Biden expressed gratitude that Mr. Trump had been swiftly evacuated and said “there’s no place in America for this kind of violence.” Mr. Biden’s campaign said in a statement that it would pause “all outbound communications” and was working to “pull down our television ads as quickly as possible.” Read more about the president’s response.

• Republicans and Democrats were quick to condemn what they viewed as an apparent act of political violence. Read more about the reaction.

• The Republican National Convention, where Mr. Trump will be formally nominated as his party’s presidential candidate, will proceed as planned in Milwaukee starting on Monday, according to a statement from the Trump campaign and R.N.C. officials.

Reporting was contributed by Nicholas Nehamas, Glenn Thrush, Campbell Robertson, Peter Baker and Katie Rogers.

The AR-15-style rifle is one of the most ubiquitous weapons in the United States.

AR-15-style rifles are frequently customized with easy-to-purchase scopes and other accessories that can make even an untrained shooter lethal.

The rifle can be built to fire heavier and lighter rounds, such as .22-caliber and .308-caliber, but most commonly fires a 5.56-millimeter round, and has an effective range of between 500 and 800 yards.

In the hands of a trained shooter, accuracy at that range is difficult but possible, especially if the rifle is supported by bipods or sandbags that can stabilize the sway of its barrel.

In 2004, the AR-15 re-entered the gun market after the end of the federal assault weapons ban, and was popularized by the rise of a video game culture that made shooting an accessible form of entertainment. The rifle was marketed as accessible and easy to personalize.

Light, precise and with little recoil, the Colt Armalite Rifle-15 Sporter was the first civilian version of the military’s M16 rifle when it first hit the market in the 1960s. It had a patented gas operating system that allowed for rapid fire and reloading. The weapon could easily handle a 20-round magazine, was easy to disassemble and was marketed, in one of Colt’s early advertisem*nts, to hunters, campers and collectors.

The sale and possession of AR-15-type rifles, and other military-style semiautomatic weapons, is banned in nine states: Washington, California, New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland, Illinois and Delaware.

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Trump supporters gather at Trump Tower: ‘I’m going to be here all night.’

“I really thought maybe he was dead. I started crying,” Ms. Randall said just before 10 p.m. on Saturday night. “When he stood up, I was so happy.”

And then right away, she said, she collected her “Make America Great Again” hat and a “Take America Back” flag and started walking toward the former president’s building.

She was not alone.

With a wall of officers guarding the tower’s gilded entrance and a smattering of news cameras nearby, some two dozen visitors had descended, even hours after the shooting, to show their support for Mr. Trump and seek solace among the shaken.

They traded stories about where they were at the moment the event turned violent and snapped pictures of each other’s Trump-red gear and trimmings.

They waved at drivers and motorcyclists who honked or fist-pumped on the way by — “We love you, Trump! We love you!” someone shouted from the road — and bobbed a little when a Whitney Houston song played from a passing pedicab.

“I’m going to be here all night,” said Lynda Andrews, 51, wearing a Trump hat and a sparkling red top and holding an American flag.

Ms. Andrews said she is originally from Pennsylvania, the state where the rally was held. As she watched Mr. Trump on Saturday from her home in Harlem, she recalled, “I went into shock.”

And then:

“I saw his hand go up,” Ms. Andrews said. “And I’m like, ‘That’s my guy.’”

She changed her clothes and headed toward Midtown.

World leaders express outrage and concern.

Here’s what some major leaders had to say.

• Hungary “My thoughts and prayers are with President Donald Trump in these dark hours,” Prime Minister Viktor Orban wrote on social media. Mr. Orban, a longtime Trump supporter, met with the former president at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida two days before the rally in Pennsylvania.

• Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, another close Trump ally, offered his prayers, adding that he was “shocked.”

• Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, whom Mr. Trump has called a leader “I like and respect,” took to social media to call the violence “irrational and inhumane.”

• Ecuador President Daniel Noboa called the attack “unacceptable,” adding that the shooting was “a critical example of what we are exposed to every day.” Last year, an Ecuadorean presidential candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, was killed in Quito by gunmen on motorcycles.

• Argentina President Javier Milei, who has long praised the leadership of Mr. Trump, was active on social media late into the evening sharing dozens of posts in support of the former president. In his own post, Mr. Milei expressed “all my support and solidarity to President and candidate Donald Trump, victim of a cowardly assassination attempt.”

• Italy “I am following with apprehension the updates from Pennsylvania, where the 45th President of the United States Donald Trump was shot during a rally,” Prime Minister Georgia Meloni wrote. A conservative leader with deep ties to the American right, she added that she hoped that “the next few months of the electoral campaign will see dialogue and responsibility prevail over hatred and violence.”

  See Also

  Donald Trump assassination attempt suspect named by FBITrump injured in shooting at Pennsylvania rally | CNN PoliticsTrump wounded at rally in assassination attempt; gunman killedTrump rally shooting was assassination attempt on ex-president, FBI says

• India Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in a post from his official account on X, said he was “deeply concerned by the attack on my friend, former President Donald Trump​,” adding: “Our thoughts and prayers are with the family of the deceased, those injured and the American people.”

• China The Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a short statement: “China is concerned about the shooting of former President Trump. President Xi Jinping has conveyed his sympathies to former President Trump.”

• Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada, who often sparred over policy disagreements with Mr. Trump when he was in office, said in a social media post that he was “sickened” to learn of the shooting. “It cannot be overstated — political violence is never acceptable.”

• Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, whose relationship with Mr. Trump got off to an awkward start after the 2019 phone call that led to then-President Trump’s first impeachment, declared himself “appalled” and said: “Never should violence prevail,” adding, “I wish America emerges stronger from this.”

• Britain Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who assumed his role a little over a week ago, said in a statement that he was “appalled” by the shooting, adding, “Political violence in any form has no place in our societies, and my thoughts are with all the victims of this attack.”

• Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said in a social media post that “we must stand firm against violence that challenges democracy.” Shinzo Abe, a former Japanese prime minister, was fatally shot while speaking at a political event in July 2022.

• France President Emmanuel Macron wrote on social media: “It is a tragedy for our democracies. France shares the shock and indignation of the American people.”

• South Korea Posting on X, President Yoon Suk Yeol wrote: “I am appalled by the hideous act of political violence.” He added: “The people of Korea stand in solidarity with the people of America.”

Reporting was contributed by Keith Bradsher,Amy Chang Chien, Chris Cameron, Choe Sang-Hun, Matina Stevis-Gridneff,Marc Santora, Motoko Rich and Anupreeta Das.

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Here is what is known about the suspected gunman.

The gunman did not have a criminal history reflected in Pennsylvania’s public court records, and officials said they had not identified a motive. A voter-registration record showed that Mr. Crooks was registered as a Republican, though federal campaign-finance records show he donated $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a liberal voter turnout group, through the Democratic donation platform ActBlue in January 2021.

Early on Sunday morning, law-enforcement officers had closed down all roads leading toward the home of the suspect’s family in Bethel Park, south of Pittsburgh and about an hour’s drive from the site of the rally in Butler. Numerous relatives did not respond to messages seeking comment.

Mr. Crooks was killed after he fired from “an elevated position” outside the outdoor rally venue where Mr. Trump was speaking, according to the Secret Service. Law enforcement officials recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle near the body of a white man they believe was the gunman, according to two law enforcement officials.

Mr. Crooks appears to have graduated in 2022 from Bethel Park High School, which has about 1,400 students, and received a $500 “star award” that year from the National Math and Science Initiative, according to The Tribune-Review in western Pennsylvania.

In an online recording of the 2022 graduation ceremony, Mr. Crooks can be seen crossing the stage to modest applause after his name is called out, a slender young man with glasses in a black graduation gown who briefly posed with a school official and accepted his diploma.

Brian Conway and Matthew Ericson contributed reporting.

Here’s what we know about the shooting.

“This evening we had what we are calling an assassination attempt against our former president, Donald Trump,” Kevin Rojek, a special agent at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said during a news conference at the Butler Township Police Department.

Here’s what we know about the shooting.

The Former President

Mr. Trump ducked quickly after the shots began and as members of the crowd began to scream. Secret Service agents then rushed Mr. Trump off the stage. As he was escorted to his motorcade, Mr. Trump, whose face and right ear were bloodied, pumped his fist in a defiant gesture to the crowd.

He later said in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform, that he had been “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”

In his social media post, Mr. Trump wrote, “I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin. Much bleeding took place, so I realized then what was happening.”

There was no immediate statement from medical personnel on the former president’s injuries or condition. Later that night, an aide to the former president posted a video on social media that showed him walking off his plane unaided after he had landed in New Jersey. His injured ear was out of camera view.

The Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee said that the former president would attend the Republican convention in Milwaukee, which is scheduled to begin on Monday.

The Suspected Shooter

The Secret Service said the shooter had fired “from an elevated position outside of the rally venue.” An analysis by The New York Times suggested that the gunman had fired eight shots.

Law enforcement officials recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle from a deceased white male they believe was the gunman, according to two law enforcement officials. .

In a statement, the F.B.I. identified the man as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pa. The authorities said they were still trying to uncover his motive.

The Secret Service has not said how it killed the shooter. It wasn’t immediately clear if he had any accomplices.

The Casualties

Michael T. Slupe, the Butler County sheriff, said the spectator who was killed was an adult male who was probably attending the rally with his family. Sheriff Slupe said the man had been in the bleachers when he was shot and that he believed the man had died at the scene.

The two people who were critically injured were taken by helicopter to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh, according to Dan Laurent, a hospital spokesman. The authorities did not immediately release further information on the spectators’ injuries.

Rep. Ronny L. Jackson, a Republican congressman from Texas and Mr. Trump’s former White House doctor, said on social media that his nephew had been injured at the rally.

The young man was treated at the rally’s medical tent and released, Mr. Jackson wrote on X, saying that “his injury was not serious and he is doing well.”

The Scene

The shooting happened as Mr. Trump was holding a large outdoor rally on the grounds of the Butler Farm Show in Butler, a town of 13,000 people about 34 miles north of Pittsburgh. Mr. Trump had been showing supporters a chart about the number of border crossings just minutes into his speech when the shots rang out. Attendees screamed, “Get down, get down!” and “Shots fired!” The Secret Service quickly cleared the press area, moved the crowd out and declared the area a crime scene. There was confusion as the crowd dispersed. Some Trump supporters held hands and prayed and then chanted “U.SA.!”

The Reaction

World leaders and elected officials across the United States, Republican and Democrat, forcefully condemned the shooting as an affront to democracy.

President Biden, in a nationally televised statement, expressed gratitude that Mr. Trump had been swiftly evacuated and said “There’s no place in America for this kind of violence.” He later spoke to Mr. Trump, according to the White House. The Biden campaign said it was pulling down its television ads as a sign that it was putting politics aside in the aftermath of the shooting.

Former President Barack Obama called on Americans to “use this moment to recommit ourselves to civility and respect in our politics.” Republicans also deplored the violence, with Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky saying: “Tonight, all Americans are grateful that President Trump appears to be fine after a despicable attack on a peaceful rally.”

It was unclear on Sunday morning how a would-be assassin had managed to open fire in the vicinity of a presidential candidate, raising questions about security preparations and potential failures.

The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability said that it would be investigating the attempted assassination and that Rep. James R. Comer, a Kentucky Republican and chairman of the panel, had asked Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the Secret Service, to testify at a hearing on July 22.

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A Texas official recounts ‘an atmosphere of shock’ during the shooting.

“Then the president went down, and I didn’t know if he took a body shot, a head shot or what,” Mr. Miller said in an interview hours after the shooting.

Mr. Miller, who was about 30 feet away from Mr. Trump, said the people around him lowered their heads and screamed. He stood near a railing, looked up and saw Mr. Trump swarmed by Secret Service agents who were shielding him.

Mr. Miller said he surveyed his surroundings, trying to determine where the bullets had come from. He saw people ducking their heads, and others scanning in circles, similarly flummoxed by what was happening.

Some attendees nearby screamed, while others cried. Security personnel carrying firearms paced throughout the crowd, clearly “on edge,” Mr. Miller said.

A few rows behind Mr. Miller, he said, was a person bleeding profusely, whose white clothes were reddening as people gathered around to help.

Mr. Miller then looked back at Mr. Trump, who was back on his feet, his face partly smeared with blood, with a wall of security personnel around him. The crowd chanted “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!” as he was rushed off the stage.

Soon, security officers directed people to exit outside.

“It was an atmosphere of shock,” Mr. Miller said.

It’s been 52 years since a presidential candidate was killed or hurt in an attack.

The latest such episode was in 1972, when Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama was shot while campaigning at a shopping center outside Washington, D.C. Mr. Wallace was partly paralyzed in the shooting and used a wheelchair until his death in 1998.

Four years earlier, Robert F. Kennedy, a senator and former U.S. attorney general, was fresh off winning California’s 1968 Democratic primary when he was fatally shot after giving a victory speech at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. His son Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is currently running for president as an independent candidate and has unsuccessfully sought Secret Service protection.

President John F. Kennedy, an older brother of Robert F. Kennedy, was fatally shot by Lee Harvey Oswald while visiting Dallas in November 1963 to shore up support for his re-election bid in 1964. His assassination shocked the nation and has spurred countless conspiracy theories over the decades.

Before Saturday, there had been at least 15 direct assaults on presidents, presidents-elect and presidential candidates, and five of them resulted in deaths, according to the Congressional Research Service.

In 1975, there were two assassination attempts on President Gerald R. Ford in less than three weeks. In the first, Lynette A. Fromme, an acolyte of Charles Manson, tried to fire a pistol at Mr. Ford as he walked from his hotel to the State Capitol in Sacramento, but the chamber had no bullet. Seventeen days later, Sara Jane Moore, who had been involved with several leftist groups, tried to shoot the president outside a hotel in San Francisco but missed when a Marine who was standing next to her knocked her arm upward as she fired.

In March 1981, about two months after his inauguration, President Ronald Reagan was shot and seriously injured outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John W. Hinckley Jr., who had been trying to draw the attention of the actress Jodie Foster after seeing her in the movie “Taxi Driver.” Mr. Hinckley was unconditionally released in 2022.

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A gleeful rally is shattered by gunfire.

Then there was a new sound. Pop.

A firecracker, it seemed. Mr. Trump grabbed at his ear. And then: Pop. Pop. Pop.

Suddenly, a day of big emotions — glee, unity and righteous anger — was now shattered by fear. Around the grandstand where Mr. Trump had been speaking, beneath an enormous American flag suspended between two cranes, the spectators crouched. Secret Service officers swarmed over Mr. Trump.

It was now clear what was happening. Thousands of people, from those in the bleachers to the many watching from a large grassy field, dropped to the ground almost in unison.

Just before the shots rang out, some in the crowd said, it seemed as if law enforcement snipers who were perched atop a barn had noticed movement nearby. The snipers seemed to be focusing on something off to the side of the grandstand in the direction of a building and a water tower just outside the farm show grounds.

“I saw them with their binoculars,” said Craig Cyrus, 54, who had come over from New Castle, Pa. “Then they got their guns.”

Once the shooting broke out, he said, the snipers returned fire.

“The first thing I thought to myself was, ‘America’s under attack,’” said Corey Check, a local conservative activist and Republican committeeman. “I grabbed the hands of a couple of people I didn’t even know. We said the Lord’s Prayer.”

Some began to cry and others screamed, while law enforcement officers shouted for everyone to get down. One of the audio speakers, apparently hit by a gunshot, toppled over.

When the popping ceased just a few seconds later, and heads rose again, the grim aftermath came into view.

Sid Miller, the commissioner of the Texas Department of Agriculture, who had come to the rally to cheer on Mr. Trump, said he turned and saw a person behind him bleeding profusely, their white clothes reddening as people gathered around to help. Others saw a man directly behind Mr. Trump, who appeared to be bleeding from the head. Several at the rally said they would later see a couple of people being carried out, limp and covered in blood.

According to the Secret Service, one person who attended the rally was killed, along with the suspect, and two spectators were seriously injured. The F.B.I. identified the suspect as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pa. And the authorities recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle at the scene, according to two law enforcement officials.

In the moment, all eyes quickly turned to Mr. Trump. Some, in the few seconds that felt like an infinity, were fearing the worst.

“I couldn’t stop crying,” said Eduardo Vargas, 31, who was sitting not far behind Mr. Trump. “I thought I just saw the president get killed in front of my face.”

But Mr. Trump returned to his feet. He had a little blood on his forehead. But he seemed not to have been badly injured. He raised his fist in the air.

The crowd cheered “USA! USA!” though the cheers were not quite as robust as they had been just a few minutes earlier. Mr. Trump was ushered into an SUV by law enforcement officers. Later, on Truth Social, Mr. Trump said that he had been “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear,” and Secret Service officials said he was safe.

Other officers then told everyone to leave, and so the tens of thousands who had come to see Mr. Trump, and sweated for hours for the chance, headed for the exits in a fog of shock and disorientation.

“I’m still so shaken up,” said Tiona Evans, 48, a child care provider from Pittsburgh, who had attended the rally as a birthday gift to herself.

The spectators returned to their trucks and cars, comparing notes on what they had seen and heard, some passing along ominous rumors or acknowledging that they had not seen much of anything in the chaos.

Nearly an hour after the shooting, after the grounds had emptied and the traffic had eased on the way out of town, Mr. Vargas, who was standing outside the entrance, was still rattled.

“I love Trump, I care for Trump, I fear for his life,” he said. “More than anything, I was scared that they got him.”

Eduardo Medina, Brian Conway, Michael Gold, Julian E. Barnes and Simon J. Levien contributed reporting.

A photo appears to capture the path of the bullet used in the attack.

Mr. Mills was using a Sony digital camera capable of capturing images at up to 30 frames per second. He took these photos with a shutter speed of 1/8,000th of a second — extremely fast by industry standards.

The other factor is the speed of the bullet from the firearm. On Saturday law enforcement authorities recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle at the scene from a deceased white man they believe was the gunman.

“If the gunman was firing an AR-15-style rifle, the .223-caliber or 5.56-millimeter bullets they use travel at roughly 3,200 feet per second when they leave the weapon’s muzzle,’’ Mr. Harrigan said. “And with a 1/8,000th of a second shutter speed, this would allow the bullet to travel approximately four-tenths of a foot while the shutter is open.”

“Most cameras used to capture images of bullets in flight are using extremely high speed specialty cameras not normally utilized for regular photography, so catching a bullet on a side trajectory as seen in that photo would be a one in a million shot and nearly impossible to catch even if one knew the bullet was coming,” he said.

In Mr. Harrigan’s last assignment, he led the bureau’s firearms training unit and currently works as a consultant in the firearms industry.

“Given the circ*mstances, if that’s not showing the bullet’s path through the air, I don’t know what else it would be,” he said.

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Lt. Col. Bivens said “it was too early” to determine if the shooting was a lone wolf attack.

“We are prepared to support this investigation in any way shape or form,” said the state police commissioner, Christopher Paris, following F.B.I. special agent Kevin Rojek at the press briefing.

Rojek, the F.B.I. special agent, said there was “no specific threat information related to this event” that the F.B.I. was aware of beforehand. He said that there “will have to be a determination” if there were security failures during the event.

Rojek confirmed that the suspected shooter had no identification on him. Agents were looking at photographs and trying to run his D.N.A., Rojek said.

Rojek said bomb specialists were deployed as a standard procedure. He could not say if the rally site was clear: “It is an active crime scene.”

Kevin Rojek, special agent of the F.B.I., says that the agency "stands with the people of Butler County” as he began speaking at the press briefing after the rally shooting.

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Videos show possible suspect lying motionless on a nearby rooftop after shooting.

A spokesman for the Secret Service, Anthony Guglielmi, said the suspected gunman “fired multiple shots toward the stage from an elevated position outside the rally venue.” The suspect had been killed, the Secret Service said.

The audio analysis of the gunshots conducted by The Times and Robert C. Maher, a gunfire acoustics expert at Montana State University in Bozeman, indicates that two bursts of shots were fired. Both the first round of three and the second of five shots were fired approximately 330 to 390 feet from the C-SPAN microphone Mr. Trump was speaking into. That location was consistent with the location of the suspect’s body. There was no significant difference between the sound of the eight shots, which suggests that they likely came from the same firearm, Mr. Maher said.

A witness told the BBC that he saw an armed man in “in muted colors, tan-typed clothing” climbing up the roof of a building of the same compound captured in the videos. The witness, who gave his name as Greg, said he attempted to alert the police to the man’s presence, minutes before the shots were fired.