Donald Trump says he was supposed to be dead, vows to unite the country after shooting attempt

Donald Trump being carried away after an assassination attempt

MILWAUKEE, July 15 – Donald Trump was in Milwaukee on Monday to make final preparations for the Republican presidential nomination later this week after narrowly escaping an assassination attempt that he said presented an opportunity to bring the country together.

Trump, 78, was holding a campaign rally on Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania – a key state in the Nov. 5 election – when a 20-year-old man with an AR-15-style rifle got close enough to shoot at the former Republican president from a rooftop.
One shot hit Trump’s upper right ear, leaving his face streaked with blood, but he was not severely wounded.
“That reality is just setting in,” Trump told the Washington Examiner on Sunday. “I rarely look away from the crowd. Had I not done that in that moment, well, we would not be talking today, would we?”
One person in the crowd was killed and two others wounded before Secret Service agents fatally shot the suspect.
One shot hit Trump’s upper right ear, leaving his face streaked with blood, but he was not severely wounded.
“That reality is just setting in,” Trump told the Washington Examiner on Sunday. “I rarely look away from the crowd. Had I not done that in that moment, well, we would not be talking today, would we?”
One person in the crowd was killed and two others wounded before Secret Service agents fatally shot the suspect.
World leaders condemned the attack, opens new tab, with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer saying he was “appalled by the shocking scenes” and French President Emanuel Macron calling the assassination attempt “a tragedy for our democracies”.
Trump pumped his fist in the air several times on Sunday appearing to mouth the words “Fight! Fight! Fight!”, as he descended the stairs from his plane after arriving in Milwaukee, where he will accept his party’s formal nomination at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.
“This is a chance to bring the whole country, even the whole world, together. The speech will be a lot different, a lot different than it would’ve been two days ago,” Trump told the Washington Examiner.
“I want to try to unite our country,” the New York Post reported Trump saying during the same interview, conducted during the flight to Milwaukee. “But I don’t know if that’s possible. People are very divided.”
Biden, a Democrat, ordered an independent review of how the gunman, who was shot dead by agents moments after opening fire, could have taken up an elevated position so close to Trump, who as a former president has lifetime protection by the U.S. Secret Service. He called for the “temperature of politics” to be lowered. “Politics must never be a literal battlefield, God forbid a killing field,” he said.
Biden and Trump spoke to each other on Saturday night after the shooting.
The man who tried to kill Trump – Thomas Crooks, 20 – was shot and killed by the Secret Service but his motive remains unknown