Before you do anything else, watch this footage of the assassination attempt of Donald Trump in real time from multiple angles. It illustrates just how much time the Secret Service and local law enforcement had to respond before the shooting started… and just how close Trump came to death. More details in links below.
In the wake of his brush with death in Butler, Pennsylvania, Donald Trump appears to be indicating that he is going to pursue a new approach to his campaign, outlined in a convention speech based on unity. This is a mistake.
In an interview on his Boeing 757 plane, the assassination attempt fresh in his mind, Trump spoke with Byron York about his intentions for his Milwaukee remarks and how they’ve changed:
It was obvious that Trump was still processing what had happened. Who wouldn’t be? It is something that will stay with him for the rest of his life. At the moment, he is grappling with the feeling that something very big has changed in his life and in the presidential race. When I asked him, “Does this change your campaign?” he immediately answered, “Yes.”
Trump explained that before Saturday night, he had finished the speech he planned to give later this week at the Republican convention. “I basically had a speech that was an unbelievable rip-roarer,” he said. “It was brutal — really good, really tough. [Last night] I threw it out. I think it would be very bad if I got up and started going wild about how horrible everybody is and how corrupt and crooked, even if it’s true. Had this not happened, we had a speech that was pretty well set that was extremely tough. Now, we have a speech that is more unifying.”
Trump did not mean that a new speech has been fully written, but parts of it have already been drafted, starting in the hours after the assassination attempt. The idea is to reframe the intense conflicts Trump has engaged in during his years in national politics. “I’ve been fighting a group of people that I considered very bad people for a long time, and they’ve been fighting me, and we’ve put up a very good fight,” Trump said. “We had a very tough speech, and I threw it out last night. I said I can’t say these things after what I’ve been through.”
I can understand why this would be the impulse — the man came a millimeter away from dying in a field less than seventy-two hours ago. But in pursuing a “unity” message — something the nation’s media elite always runs to when they fear being blamed when things happen for which they bear responsibility — Trump is about to make several mistakes. First, he’s sacrificing the moral high ground he now occupies. Second, he’s catering to his critics, who have been beating the drum that Trump himself, short skirt style, created the atmosphere that led to his near-death. And third, he’s ignoring the temperature of the nation and voter frustration with everything around them in favor of some limp noodle message in an attempt to get plaudits from the Atlantic and the New York Times.
Trump’s shooting had a devastating effect on the entire narrative advanced by the American left and their allies in the media for nearly a decade: that it is Trump who puts people in harm’s way with dangerous and irresponsible rhetoric, as opposed to a constant drumbeat carried across networks and social media, furthered by nearly every aspect of culture, that Trump’s rise represents the rise of an American fourth Reich. They ignore the reality that two thirds to three quarters of Americans think the country is headed in the wrong direction and instead blame Trump and his allies for noticing and pointing it out.
The ludicrous post-shooting claims of CBS’s Margaret Brennan, the expressions of fear from MSNBC’s Jen Psaki, and the poisonous spew of the Atlantic’s David Frum all still frame Trump as a would-be dictator who bears a responsibility to tamp down on the temperature of our political discourse. These are disingenuous lies designed to deflect from their own failings and to instill in the minds of readers and viewers that it is till Donald Trump who could in an instant put jackboots in the street. There’s no unity to be had with such a perspective, and Republicans, Trump included, should not pretend otherwise. It’s the media’s responsibility to tone down their own rhetoric, no one else’s. We do not have to accept a false equivalency with a side that puts Trump in a Hitler mustache or has Kathy Griffin holding his bloody head.
Awareness of one’s own mortality should make you more compelled to lean into the truth instead of glossing over our differences. Trump muses to Byron York:
“I’d love to achieve unity if you could achieve unity, if that’s possible,” Trump said. “There are many good people on the other side… But there are also people who are very divided. Some people actually want open borders, and some people don’t want open borders. The question is can those two sides get together? Can sides where you have people who want to see men play in women’s sports and you have a side that doesn’t understand even the concept of allowing that to happen [get together]?”
The answer is: no, they can’t. In a democratic republic, we have elections to resolve these questions — one side wins, one side loses, and we move on. Either borders should be open or they shouldn’t. Either a biological man can race against biological women or they can’t. Either abortions kill a human life or they don’t. These are very real divisions and pretending they aren’t ignores truth for the sake of a bland “can’t we all get along” lie. Trump should not make the mistake of letting his experience cause him to shift away from taking strong stands on the most divisive topics in the country. Not everyone will win, and not everyone will be satisfied, but they will still be Americans who can make their voices heard. That’s how our system of government works, or at least how it should. Under Trump, we saw the degree to which our corrupt institutions are willing to reject the will of voters because they think they know better.
Party donors, corporate leaders, editorial page columnists and people tired of politics find unity to be a virtue — and it can be. But unity is not a higher aim than securing our border, protecting women in sports or defending innocent human life. Donald Trump saying that he has a rip-roaring acceptance speech that he’s throwing out in favor of a message of unity ignores the very reason he’s in a place to give that speech for a third time: that he, more successfully than any other modern politician, has channeled the frustrations of a citizenry abandoned by their leaders and disrespected by the institutions of our country in exchange for the pursuit of plaudits from a ruling class who called for “unity” above the American interest.
It’s OK to be angry. Some fury is righteous. Trump shouldn’t hesitate to channel it. That’s what he’s here to do. He can call for unity if he wins.
Assassination and the Crisis of Legitimacy
Over the last five decades, America’s political and media elites have been shockingly energetic in attacking the legitimacy of the political system that produces and maintains them. They have done so on a bipartisan basis. And they have done so much more vigorously with the advent of cable television and online media that precisely target specific segments of American society.
Consider American political messaging. For decades, elected Democrats and Democratic political activists have regularly and routinely assailed America’s political system as unrepresentative and unfair. During the same decades, elected Republicans and Republican political activists have regularly condemned the U.S. federal government as ineffective or even menacing.
Regardless of who they are hearing—and some Americans are listening to both Democrats and Republicans—voters hear continuous attacks on “the system” or on “systemic” problems in America’s politics, economy, and society. It is not possible to attack “the system” or to describe America’s challenges as “systemic” without undermining the legitimacy of the U.S. political system. Both approaches directly assault public trust in the institutions of government. Because both parties (and supporting activist groups) seek to exploit every possible legal loophole to secure electoral victories, this criticism was bound to expand beyond America’s institutions to its governing processes, including elections. And it has done so.
The American media have made this problem worse. Since Richard Nixon’s resignation following the Watergate scandal, U.S. media have relentlessly hunted for, exposed, and denounced flaws in virtually all American institutions, including federal, state, and local governments, legislatures, courts, the military, businesses, churches, charities, and ultimately the media itself. Yes—this is their job. Notwithstanding this, their work has generally buttressed the credibility, widened the dissemination, and intensified the impact of political attacks on American institutions.
The great danger is that after the Butler shooting, events may develop more independently of the actors and the environment that produced these tragic moments. The motive for the assassination attempt remains unknown at this time, but this may not matter: the attack is widely considered politically motivated. Even if the perpetrator is found to have been mentally ill, it will be challenging to frame the attempted shooting of a presidential candidate as a non-political event. How Americans respond to the attempt—and to the deaths that took place—will be decisive.
More Details on Assassination Attempt
The Secret Service must be held accountable for its failure.
Secret Service didn’t sweep building where gunman shot Trump.
Thomas Matthew Crooks, Trump shooter, was 20 year old loner.
Jack Smith Classified Docs Case Dismissed
Judge Aileen Cannon tees up a challenge to appointment.
A federal judge dismissed the classified documents prosecution against Donald Trump on Monday, siding with the former president’s argument that special counsel Jack Smith was unlawfully appointed.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in Florida said federal law didn’t authorize Smith to conduct the prosecution. No legal authority “gives the Attorney General broad inferior-officer appointing power or bestows upon him the right to appoint a federal officer with the kind of prosecutorial power wielded by Special Counsel Smith,” the judge wrote in the 93-page ruling.
The indictment had charged Trump with 40 felony counts alleging he willfully kept classified material after he left the White House and obstructed the government’s repeated efforts to get it back.
Trump, who survived an assassination attempt on Saturday, welcomed the ruling. “As we move forward in Uniting our Nation after the horrific events on Saturday, this dismissal of the Lawless Indictment in Florida should be just the first step, followed quickly by the dismissal of ALL the Witch Hunts,” he wrote in a social-media post, referring to the three other criminal cases he faces.
Poll: Democratic Party Struggles
A new national NBC News poll — conducted after President Joe Biden’s bad debate performance and before a gunman fired at former President Donald Trump and rallygoers in Pennsylvania on Saturday — found the presidential contest remaining stable and competitive, with Biden trailing former President Donald Trump by 2 points in the survey.
The result was well within the poll’s margin of error and had the same margin as April’s survey.
Still, the survey showed the toll the debate and its aftermath took on the president and his party — though it's unclear how public sentiment in a shocked nation will shift in the wake of Saturday's shooting.
In the poll, more than 60% of Democrats said they would prefer someone else as the party’s presidential nominee. Almost 80% of all voters reported having concerns about Biden’s mental and physical fitness.
And the popularity of the Democratic Party declined, matching its all-time low in the three-decade history of the NBC News poll.
Yet the 2024 head-to-head matchup was relatively unchanged, at least for that moment — partly because of voter sentiment about not just Biden but also Trump. That included a majority of voters continuing to hold negative views of the former president, while Trump faced deficits versus Biden on the questions of temperament and being honest and trustworthy.
Feature
Items of Interest
Foreign
A globally integrated Islamic State.
What does America think of Keir Starmer?
Europe to boycott Hungary summit.
Domestic
Lawmakers fear violence after shooting.
Pro-lifers abandon platform fight at GOP.
What will abortion policy be under another Trump admin?
A “you are here” moment for the pro-life movement.
Evictions surge in major cities.
Jon Stewart: Academics mock free speech because they aren’t threatened.
Joe Biden’s grandchild makes heartfelt plea to meet him.
Lawfare
McCarthy: If you want to mend our political divide, end lawfare.
2024
Trump heads to Milwaukee with a united GOP.
Elon Musk, others respond to assassination attempt with endorsements.
Biden urges calmdown in primetime speech.
“Lock him up” chants at Biden rally, which he does not refute.
Biden withdraws into inner circle after criticism.
Former Democrat lawmakers press for open convention.
Media
Deranged CBS host lectures Scalise on violent rhetoric.
Morning Joe pulled offair after assassination.
Top Democrat pushed reporters to consider staged shooting.
RedState 20th anniversary retrospective.
Health
Why is the U.S. still pretending gender affirming care works?
Ephemera
Paris Olympics is turning into a financial flop.
Roku brings on Good Morning Football.
First look at Stranger Things Season 5.
Tim Robbins addresses similarity of shooting with Bob Roberts film.
Matthew McConaughey doesn’t rule out run for political office.
Quote
“It is a very natural thing that weak and vicious minds should be inflamed to acts of violence by the kind of awful mendacity and abuse that have been heaped upon me for the last three months by the papers in the interest of not only Mr. Debs but of Mr. Wilson and Mr. Taft. Friends, I will disown and repudiate any man of my party who attacks with such foul slander and abuse any opponent of any other party; and now I wish to say seriously to all the daily newspapers, to the Republicans, the Democrat, and Socialist parties, that they cannot, month in month out and year in and year out, make the kind of untruthful, of bitter assault that they have made and not expect that brutal, violent natures, or brutal and violent characters, especially when the brutality is accompanied by a not very strong mind; they cannot expect that such natures will be unaffected by it.”
— Teddy Roosevelt, immediately after surviving an assassination attempt.