A Shooting at rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday that Former President Donald Trump Injured has heightened concerns about political violence and awareness of past attacks and assassination attempts against presidents and candidates.
In a social media post Saturday night, Trump thanked law enforcement for their quick response after he was “shot through the top of my right ear.”
The Butler County District Attorney confirms to CBS Pittsburgh station KDKA that two people died — the shooter and a member of the audience. Two law enforcement sources told CBS News that the shooter was killed by a Secret Service sniper. Two other attendees are in critical condition.
Reporters heard multiple gunshots and Secret Service rushed to the scene. Video captured by CBS News shows Trump touching his ear and then crouching on the ground. Blood could be seen on his face.
/ Getty Images
Past direct attacks on presidents and candidates
Direct attacks on presidents, presidents-elect, and candidates have occurred 15 times, five of which resulted in deaths, according to a 2008 report by the Congressional Research Service. Of the 45 people in office, 13 (or about 29 percent) have been victims of assassination or attempted assassination. That figure does not include the latest incident involving Trump.
At least seven of the last nine presidents have been the target of assault, attack or assassination attempts. The Congressional Research Service report says presidents who have survived attacks include Gerald R. Ford (twice in 1975), Ronald W. Reagan (a near-fatal shooting in 1981), Bill Clinton (when the White House was shot at in 1994) and George W. Bush (when an assailant threw an unexploded grenade at him and the president of Georgia during an event in Tbilisi in 2005). The latest Congressional Research Service report, citing the Secret Service as a source, also says attempts have been made against former President Barack Obama, Trump and President Biden.
Two other presidents have been attacked, either as president-elect (Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933) or as presidential candidates (Theodore Roosevelt in 1912, when he ran for president after being out of office for nearly four years).
Two other presidential candidates — Robert F. Kennedy, killed in 1968, and George C. Wallace, seriously wounded in 1972 — were also victims of direct attacks, according to the report compiled by the Congressional Research Service.
Presidents who were assassinated
Four presidents – Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, William McKinley and John F. Kennedy – were assassinated.
Of the 15 attacks listed in the report, only Lincoln’s assassination was the result of a larger conspiracy, the report said. But conspiracy theories still surround many of those events.
Only one incident—the Lincoln assassination—proved the existence of a vast conspiracy, although such allegations were raised on other occasions. Only one other incident involved more than one participant—the attack on Blair House, the temporary residence of President Harry S. Truman, in 1950. But no evidence of the existence of other conspirators emerged from the investigation or subsequent prosecutions.
Of the 18 attacks or assassination attempts on presidents or presidential candidates, all but two involved firearms. All but two attacks, both on Ford, were committed by men. All but one of the 15 attacks occurred in the United States.
First documented attack on a president
According to the Congressional Research Service, the first attack occurred in 1835, when an assailant fired a pistol at President Andrew Jackson. The assailant, Richard Lawrence, was declared insane. He said that “Jackson was preventing him from obtaining large sums of money and was ruining the country,” the report said.
Source: Congressional Research Service, 2008 and 2024
— Jake Miller and John Kelly contributed reporting.
