Overview:
• Former President Donald Trump was shot at a MAGA rally in Pennsylvania, with the shooter being fatally shot by a Secret Service sniper.
• An attending firefighter was also tragically killed while shielding his family from the incident.
Former President Donald Trump attended the Republican National Convention is Milwaukee Monday after being was shot Saturday afternoon at a MAGA rally in rural Butler, Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh. Video of the twice impeached and 34 times convicted felon, who is the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee, showed him grabbing the side of his face and later bleeding as Secret Service agents tackled him. Several shots rang out as the crowd screamed in fear. Trump appeared to have been bleeding as Secret Service agents rushed him out of the venue.
Trump posted on social media he was “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”
The shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks from Bethel, Pennsylvania, was fatally shot on a nearby rooftop by a Secret Service sniper.
Corey Comperatore, a firefighter attending the rally with his family, was fatally shot by the shooter while shielding his family. Two other people at the rally were also shot.
President Joe Biden issued the following statement immediately following the incident:
“I have been briefed on the shooting at Donald Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania. I’m grateful to hear that he’s safe and doing well. I’m praying for him and his family and for all those who were at the rally, as we await further information.
“Jill and I are grateful to the Secret Service for getting him to safety. There’s no place for this kind of violence in America. We must unite as one nation to condemn it.”
“Yesterday’s shooting at Donald Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania calls on all of us to take a step back, take stock of where we are, how we go forward from here.
Thankfully, former [President] Trump is not seriously [injured]. I spoke with him last night. I’m grateful he’s doing well. And Jill and I keep him and his family in our prayers.”
“We also extend our deepest condolences to the family of the victim who was killed. Corey was a husband, a father, a volunteer firefighter, a hero, sheltering his family from those bullets. We should all hold his family and all those injured in our prayers.
“Earlier today, I spoke about an ongoing investigation. We do not know the motive of the shooter yet. We don’t know his opinions or affiliations. We don’t know whether he had help or support or if he communicated with anyone else. Law enforcement professionals, as I speak, are investigating those questions.
“Tonight, I want to speak to what we do know: A former president was shot. An American citizen killed while simply exercising his freedom to support the candidate of his choosing.
“We cannot — we must not go down this road in America. We’ve traveled it before throughout our history. Violence has never been the answer whether it’s with members of Congress in both parties being targeted in the shot, or a violent mob attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, or a brutal attack on the spouse of former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, or information and intimidation on election officials, or the kidnapping plot against a sitting governor, or an attempted assassination on Donald Trump.”