Moments after shots were fired at Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, Greg Smith told BBC, “We noticed a guy crawling, bear-crawling up the roof of the building beside us, 50 feet away from us. So we’re standing there, we’re pointing at the guy crawling up the roof.” In response to a question on whether he saw the suspect with a gun, Smith said, “A rifle, we could clearly see him with a rifle, absolutely. We’re pointing at him, the police are down there running around on the ground, we’re like, hey man, there’s a guy on the roof with a rifle. And the police are like, huh, what, they didn’t know what was going on, we’re like right here on the roof, we can see him from right here, we see him, he’s crawling.”
Moments later, shots rang out. Trump held his ear, blood streaked his face and Trump ducked to the ground as the Secret Service rushed in to encircle him. The microphone picked up the conversation between Trump and the Secret Service agents. Vatan Cana was also present at the rally. He remembers seeing Trump down a moment and up the next. “I was able to pull out my phone, started recording as soon as I got this, as soon as Donald Trump got up, we all got up and he was like, pumping with his fist and we were all cheering and cheering and cheering.”
Saurabh Sharma, President of Conservative Non-Profit American Moment had a ringside view of what happened. “President Trump missed that bullet by an angel’s breath,” said Sharma. “And thank God for that (immigration) chart (that Donald Trump was referring to at the rally), because I think it’s because of his head turning left and right as he was explaining the things that were on that chart that that first bullet actually missed him.”
The bullet grazed Donald Trump’s ear, narrowly missing him. One person at the rally was killed, two others were seriously injured. Trump’s photograph, pumping the air with his fist, became the defining shot of the rally.
The FBI has identified the shooter as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. Snipers on the roof at the rally shot dead the shooter moments after he fired the first bullet. The motive behind the assassination attempt remains unclear.
Johnny Palmadessa, eyewitness and Democratic strategist who was attending the rally to speak to Trump’s supporters, told Reuters, “What I witnessed was surreal and devastating. I watched as the crowd of people up front started rushing and walking towards me. I watched mothers shield their children from bullets. I watched husbands jump on their wives. I watched elderly people struggle to leave fast enough. Some of them practically gave up and decided, ‘I’m just going to wait here because I can’t get out right now’. That’s not okay. No family should experience what that’s what’s happened.”
Saurabh Sharma also feels that Trump’s ‘fist shot’ energised the crowd that was unsure of what had happened. “First thing I saw was him, you know, reaching out his fist to the audience. Come to find out later that he was saying “fight, fight” and that definitely caused a ripple through the crowd. Everyone noticed that – it really kind of energized everyone.”
Hours after surviving the assassination attempt, Trump reached Milwaukee where he will be formally nominated as the Republican party’s presidential nominee later this week.
President Biden has ordered a review of how the 20-year old gunmen managed to get on to the roof and get within 140 metres of the former President who, as ex-President, continues to have U.S Secret Service protection.
