Former US President Donald Trump was shot in the ear during a campaign rally in an attack that drew condemnation from top Republicans and Democrats and is being investigated as an attempted assassination.
Saturday's shooting left blood stains on Trump's face and sparked panic among thousands of people who attended the rally in the Pennsylvania town of Butler.
Trump's campaign said the Republican presidential nominee was “doing fine” after the shooting, which the former leader said pierced the top of his right ear. At least one bystander was killed and two others were seriously injured, according to authorities.
The Secret Service said it shot and killed the suspected attacker.
The shooting occurred after Trump, 78, began his speech. The former president grabbed his right ear with his right hand, then lowered his hand to look at it before kneeling behind the podium. Secret Service agents surrounded Trump, before he emerged and raised his fist in the air, apparently mouthing the words “Fight! Fight! Fight!”
He was then taken off the scene and into a vehicle.
“I was shot with a bullet that went through the top of my right ear,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform after the shooting. “There was a lot of bleeding.”
The FBI called the attack an “attempted murder” and said it had taken the lead in investigating the case.
Agency spokesman Kevin Rojek said authorities had identified the shooter but did not release details. He said the motive for the shooting was not immediately clear.
The attack was the most serious assassination attempt on a US president or presidential candidate since Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981. It came in a deeply polarized political environment, just four months before the presidential election and days before Trump is set to be officially named the Republican nominee at his party's convention, which his campaign has said would go ahead as planned.
“It looked like an attempted murder”
US President Joe Biden was quick to condemn the attack.
“There is no place in America for this kind of violence,” said Biden, who is competing against Trump as the presumptive Democratic nominee. “It’s sick. It’s sick.”
Ron Moose, a Trump supporter who was at the rally, described the chaos: “I heard about four shots and I saw the crowd fall to the ground and then Trump ducked down really quickly as well. Then the entire Secret Service jumped in and protected him as quickly as they could. We’re talking about within a second everyone was protecting him.”
Moose said he then saw a man running and being chased by officers in military uniforms. He said he heard more gunshots, but was not sure who fired them. He said that by then, snipers had set up shop on the roof of a warehouse behind the stage.
The shots apparently came from outside the area secured by the Secret Service, the agency said.
Republican U.S. Senate candidate David McCormick, who was sitting in the front row at the rally, said he had started to walk up to the stage when Trump said he would bring him up later.
“A minute or two later, I heard the gunshots… It was clear that they were gunshots,” he told Reuters news agency. “It sounded like an assassination attempt… It was terrifying.”
The attack drew condemnation from leaders of both political parties.
“This horrific act of political violence at a peaceful campaign rally has no place in this country and must be unanimously and strongly condemned,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, said on social media.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, said he was horrified by what happened and relieved that Trump was safe.
“Political violence has no place in our country,” he said.
Some of Trump's Republican allies said they believed the attack was politically motivated.
“For weeks, Democratic leaders have been stoking a ridiculous hysteria that Donald Trump’s reelection would be the end of democracy in America,” said U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, the second House Republican to survive a politically motivated shooting in 2017.
“It is clear that we have seen far-left lunatics engage in violent rhetoric in the past. This incendiary rhetoric must end.”
Hardline Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said: “Democrats wanted this to happen. They have wanted Trump gone for years and are willing to do anything to make that happen.”
Trump, who was president from 2017 to 2021, easily outpaced his rivals for the Republican nomination early in the campaign. He has largely unified around him a party that had briefly wavered in support after his supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in an attempt to overturn his 2020 election loss.
The businessman and former reality TV star began the year facing numerous legal troubles, including four separate criminal prosecutions. He was found guilty in late May of trying to cover up money payments to an adult film actress to keep her from doing anything, but the three other prosecutions he faces, including two over his attempts to overturn his election defeat, have been stalled by several factors, including a Supreme Court decision earlier this month that declared him partially immune from prosecution.
Trump claims without evidence that the four impeachments were orchestrated by Biden to try to prevent him from returning to power.
World leaders condemn the attack
Trump's children took to social media to express their shock.
“This is the fighter America needs!” his son Eric Trump wrote over a photo of his father with blood running down his cheek, his fist in the air and an American flag waving in the background as he was rushed offstage by the Secret Service.
Donald Trump Jr posted the same photo on X and wrote: “He will never stop fighting to save America.”
“I love you dad, today and always,” his daughter Ivanka posted on X, thanking her followers and the Secret Service for their “swift and decisive actions today.”
“I continue to pray for our country,” he said.
World leaders also condemned the attack.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who took office earlier this month, said he condemned all forms of political violence in the strongest terms and sent his “best wishes” to Trump and his family.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said he was praying for Trump's speedy recovery and called for a firm stance against “any form of violence that challenges democracy.”
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was “deeply concerned by the attack on my friend,” while Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said the shooting “must be strongly condemned by all defenders of democracy and political dialogue.”
Meanwhile, tech billionaire Elon Musk said he “fully” supports Trump following the violence.
“I fully support President Trump and look forward to his speedy recovery,” Musk wrote on X, sharing a video of Trump pumping his fist as he was escorted away by Secret Service officials.
