Former US president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump looks on during a campaign rally at site of the first assassination attempt against him in Butler, Pennsylvania on October 5, 2024. Photo / AFP
Former US president and current Republican nominee Donald Trump is set to return on Saturday to the fairgrounds where he narrowly escaped an assassin’s bullet on July 13, in what has become another defining moment for his presidential campaign and his Make America Great Again (Maga) movement.
The campaign is bringing back many attendees who sat in the bleachers behind Trump at the July rally, where a gunman shooting from a nearby roof grazed the former president’s ear, killed one attendee and wounded two others.
Saturday’s event is expected to draw thousands and will feature survivors of the shooting and tributes to the victims and first responders, plus Trump’s running mate, Senator JD Vance (R-Ohio), billionaire backer Elon Musk and the singer of Trump’s walkout anthem, Lee Greenwood.
Speaking to the crowd, Vance repeated the right-wing talking point that Democratic warnings about Trump as a threat to democracy because of his attempts to overturn the 2020 election spurred the attempted assassination against him.
“How dare you talk about threats to democracy?” Vance said of US Vice-President Kamala Harris, Trump’s opponent. “Donald Trump took a bullet for democracy. What the hell have you done?”
He opened his speech by recounting the attempt: “Now, 84 days ago, of course, on this very field, an assassin tried to fill our hearts with terror,” Vance said. “But we’re here to say we can’t be intimidated. We cannot be stopped. We won’t be denied.”
The assassination attempt has become a growing emphasis for Trump and his supporters, especially after another gunman tried to kill him on September 15, and intelligence officials briefed the former president last week on ongoing threats to his safety from Iran. While the Butler gunman’s motives remain unknown, Trump’s movement now commonly discusses the shooting as part of a long sequence of hardships that includes investigations, impeachments and prosecutions - and Trump frequently mentions it on the campaign trail. “I think I was going to say, ‘As I was saying’,” Trump said to preview his plans for Saturday’s speech during a news conference on Tuesday.
The return to Butler also demonstrates how much the race for the White House has changed in less than three months. On Trump’s last visit, he was about to formally accept the Republican nomination and name his running mate with a commanding lead in national and swing-state polls after US President Joe Biden’s halting, muddled performance in a June debate. This time, Trump is narrowly trailing Harris in most polls, lagging in fundraising and campaign infrastructure, and hammering on his most enduring themes of immigration and crime in the search for a winning message against her.
Another tangible change took the form of beefed-up security. Roads around the fairgrounds were blocked off in advance on Friday, and box trucks formed a protective ring around the venue, blocking sightlines from the road. The county sheriff told local news undercover and uniformed officers would be deployed throughout the crowd.
The Secret Service admitted multiple failures in preparation and communication that allowed the gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, to reach an unpatrolled roof about 150 yards (137.16m) from the stage on July 13. Counter-snipers killed Crooks at the scene. Investigators have not identified a motive, any political or ideological dimension, or any foreign connection to the shooting. Crooks, 20, was a registered Republican who also gave a small donation to a liberal PAC. He had researched past assassinations and had photos on his phone of both Trump and Biden.
Trump was less than 10 minutes into his speech when Crooks opened fire. Trump’s head was turned to look at a chart displayed on a screen next to the stage, a motion that he and many of his supporters believe saved his life.
“It’s going to be a very emotional day for a lot of people,” said John Fredericks, a pro-Trump radio host based in Pennsylvania. “A lot of us believe that it was God’s will that he turned his head.”
The maze to enter the rally was completely full by 9am on Saturday, an hour before doors opened. People baaed like sheep and mooed like cows as they snaked through the barricades, with occasional chants of “USA!” and “Fight!” Many in line wore shirts or earrings with images of the assassination attempt and discussed their experience here the last time.
“From one angle, it kind of looked like an angel flying in the sky,” one woman recalled, showing photos to new friends in line.
Her husband, wearing a shirt with an assault rifle labelled “Hell No, Joe”, wondered aloud why neighbours refused to discuss political disagreements.
On the evening before the rally, a group of Trump supporters camping out to be among the first to enter the rally formed an impromptu prayer circle under a giant flag bearing Trump’s mugshot and the words “NEVER SURRENDER”. Passing cars honked or blasted music in support. One motorist booed.
A woman from the Butler area named Tracey Baker recalled how before the shooting on July 13, the flag suspended above the stage became tangled in the wind. A nearby church had put up a billboard of the image along the main road. “It was an angel,” she said. “If you believe in God, you only would have seen that. You knew what it was. You couldn’t deny it.”
She added: “This president is bringing unity back to our country. There’s another side that don’t want to do it, obviously. But I think there’s a bigger side that does.”
Jeb Bordewyk from Rapid City, South Dakota, recalled a line from Trump’s inaugural address: “There should be no fear - we are protected, and we will always be protected … by God.”
Susan Sevy from East Liverpool, Ohio drew a connection between the time of the shooting, 6.11pm, and the Bible verse Ephesians 6:11: “Put on the full armour of God that you may be able to stand firm against the wiles of the devil.”
Others spoke of the sense of camaraderie and family they felt at Trump gatherings, and of their frustration with government benefits they believed were going to undocumented immigrants while they worked multiple jobs and struggled to get by.
A mobile billboard truck parked near the fairgrounds displayed rotating memes, including a picture of Trump with Jesus behind him, captioned: “It’s okay. They called me guilty too.” Throughout the afternoon, a man dragged a life-size wooden crucifix up and down the road between tents selling Trump shirts, flags and signs with the iconic photo of him raising his fist and shouting “Fight!” after being shot.
At a Friday event in North Carolina, a Vietnam veteran identified as Dwight said he had given Trump his Purple Heart medal for surviving the assassination attempt.
“I got very lucky - and maybe it wasn’t so much luck, maybe it was something else,” Trump said, looking up as the crowd clapped.