The campaign rally for Donald Trump on July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania, outside Pittsburgh began as all his rallies do: Music, Trump leaning into the mic starting to tell a story but then—shots rang out and everything changed. Within minutes, Trump had been carried off-stage by a group of Secret Service agents, but not without pumping his fist in the air, and yelling “fight” repeatedly as blood streamed down his face from where a bullet had grazed his ear.
The now-iconic image taken by New York Times photographer Doug Mills, who also captured a shot of the bullet whizzing toward Trump’s head, was already on T-shirts within 12 hours of the mass shooting.
The shooter was killed by snipers, but not before shooting three other people in addition to Trump. Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, has been determined to be a registered Republican, a loner, bullied in high school and with no known domestic terrorism links. It has long been argued that lone gunmen hope to jump-start larger political actions—like a race war or civil war.
As Politico wrote last year, “In a deeply polarized environment, smaller pockets of armed unrest could easily ignite and spread disorder.”
GOP members of Congress were quick to flood Twitter/X with statements blaming President Joe Biden for the act with some calling for his arrest.
Rep. Mike Collins (GA) wrote: “The Republican District Attorney in Butler County, PA, should immediately file charges against Joseph R. Biden for inciting an assassination.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA) wrote: “Joe Biden told donors it’s ‘time to put Trump in a bull’s eye,’ and that is EXACTLY what happened.
“House Democrats, led by Bennie Thompson, introduced a bill to strip USSS protection from President Trump.
“The weaponized DOJ has done everything they can to make sure President Trump spends the rest of his life in PRISON, while sending non-violent J6ers to jail for years.
“They want President Trump and his supporters dead.
“We won’t forget.”
Biden calls for unity, end to divisive rhetoric
President Biden took to the airways several times after the attack on Trump. He called the former president to check on his well-being in a brief conversation Trump deemed as “very nice.”
On July 14, Biden — flanked by Vice President Kamala Harris and Attorney General Merrick Garland — said in a brief speech, “Unity is the most elusive goal of all, but nothing is more important than that right now. We’ll debate and we’ll disagree, but we must unite as one nation to demonstrate who we are as Americans.”
Later, in prime time, Biden spoke from the Oval Office in a speech carried on every network. He called for unity and offered his condolences to the family of the man killed and his prayers for the two wounded bystanders still in critical condition.
In another video posted on Twitter/X, Biden said, “We must stand for an America not of extremism and fury. But of decency and grace.”
Biden and Harris suspended campaigning for a day and pulled their ads from the airwaves.
Trump beats the court system
Trump got a massive gift on the first day of the Republican National Convention. In a 93-page ruling, Florida U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the Trump classified documents case. It was a big win for Trump and allowed him to once again frame the legal battles he faces as “election interference.”
Special counsel Jack Smith’s office is appealing the ruling and in a statement from spokesperson Peter Carr said, “The dismissal of the case deviates from the uniform conclusion of all previous courts to have considered the issue that the Attorney General is statutorily authorized to appoint a Special Counsel. The Justice Department has authorized the Special Counsel to appeal the court’s order.”
That ruling was followed by the news July 15 that the Georgia Court of Appeals has scheduled oral arguments for Dec. 5 to hear an appeal by Trump and his allies to disqualify Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from prosecuting the Georgia election interference case. The case involves allegations of an attempt to overturn the results of Georgia’s 2020 presidential election.
Trump’s appeal is an attempt to remove Willis from the case. Willis was revealed to have had a relationship with an attorney she hired to work on the case, raising ethics questions. If Trump is re-elected, the case could be delayed until 2029 or potentially dropped.
The ruling by Cannon carries the most weight as it references the Supreme Court’s immunity decision and the very notion that a Special Counsel has grounds to operate.
Trump attorney Christopher Kise said in a statement, “Judge Cannon today restored the rule of law and made the right call for America. From the outset, the Attorney General and Special Counsel have ignored critical constitutional restrictions on the exercise of the prosecutorial power of the United States.”
Trump was indicted in the case in June 2023. That indictment accused Trump of misleading federal investigators to keep documents that he knew were still classified after he left the White House.
The indictment also alleged that the documents Trump took with him “included information regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the U.S. and foreign countries; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for a possible retaliation in response to a foreign attack.”
Trump faced 40 charges stemming from his handling of documents marked classified after leaving office and allegedly obstructing the Justice Department’s investigation.
Trump was quick to respond, posting on Truth Social saying “I am thrilled.”
RNC: mostly white, mostly 50+, 100% MAGA
The RNC is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a Democrat-helmed city that also has the largest Black demographic in the key battleground state, and which Trump has previously called “horrible.” The site is heavily policed with an atmosphere the Inquirer’s Will Bunch described as “eerie.”
Watching the roll call for the Trump nomination, the sheer whiteness of the event was in bold relief. With the exception of the territories, it was a decidedly white-presenting group. Speakers in the first two days have been overwhelmingly white with a few notable exceptions: former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott, Sen. Ted Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio. Philadelphia native and celebrity influencer Amber Rose also spoke at the RNC.
But any specific outreach to Black and Latin@ voters was missing. And Trump’s choice for vice president, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance was meant solely to solidify the base and maybe garner some votes from the key Rust Belt states Trump lost in 2020—Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Ohio has been a reliable red state for years.
From the first two days of the RNC. The demographics in the space have been vivid: despite the rhetoric pushed in mainstream media that Trump has made inroads with young and Black voters, this is largely an older white venue, which suggests that there is no bridge at present to bring in new voters outside the established MAGA contingent and those disenchanted with Biden on the economy and immigration—key discourse in the first half of the convention.
Media silence
MSNBC silenced its regular line up of pundits after the assassination attempt.
MSNBC pulled its popular—and regularly anti-Trump—”Morning Joe” program, hosted by Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, from airing on July 15 in the wake of the assassination attempt.
A CNN report, claimed the decision was made in part over fear that one of the show’s many guests over a four-hour broadcast “might make an inappropriate comment on live television that could be used to assail the program and network as a whole.” MSNBC denied the CNN report.
What happened at MSNBC was part of a larger tonal shift in mainstream media—a hands-off approach to Trump in the wake of the violence on July 13 and Biden’s calls for unity and ratcheting down the tenor of political rhetoric nationally. There was consistent commentary on all networks and from every news site about “both sides” having inflammatory rhetoric. But that rhetoric has come from Trump for years. What’s more, on July 2, Kevin Roberts of the Heritage Foundation — architect of Project 2025 — said, “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless, if the left allows it to be.”
But while media was quiet about Trump’s clearly delineated autocratic actions over months, culminating in the embrace of Project 2025, Trump and RNC speakers divested of the unity platform to instead push their agenda, attack Biden and generally instigate yet more division in this polarized nation, focusing on immigration and crime, promoting long debunked talking points about “Biden’s open borders.”
Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake attacked the media as “fake news” while Elise Stefanik, chair of the House Republican Conference, called Biden “feckless and failed” and said he’s caused “chaos.”
Vance voiced his own support for mass deportation in an interview with Sean Hannity, the Fox News host, on July 15.
“We have to deport people,” Vance told Hannity. “We have to deport people who broke our laws who came in here. And I think we need to start with the violent criminals.”
Democrats in disarray
As the RNC builds toward Thursday’s crescendo with Trump and Vance giving their respective speeches, centrist House Democrats are still mulling pushing Biden out as top of the ticket, with Senate candidate Adam Schiff leading that call.
It will be a chaotic next few weeks, with Trump riding the wave of his brush with death and the perception of his followers that he was saved by divine hand to lead America and “make it great again,” while Democrats fight amongst themselves.