Trump plans to return to Butler, Pennsylvania, to honor slain supporter and those injured during assassination attempt
By Eric Bradner and Kit Maher, CNN
(CNN) — Donald Trump said Friday he plans to return to Butler, Pennsylvania – the place where the former president survived an assassination attempt nearly two weeks ago – for a rally that will honor slain supporter Corey Comperatore and those injured in the shooting.
Trump announced the “big and beautiful” rally in an all-caps post on his Truth Social platform, noting that the event would be “honoring the soul of our beloved firefighting hero, Corey, and those brave patriots injured two weeks ago.” He did not say when the rally would take place.
Trump was minutes into his speech on July 13 when a gunman fired eight shots at the stage in Butler, a city north of Pittsburgh in one of the most important battleground states of the 2024 election.
Trump’s right ear was bloodied, and he appeared days later at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee wearing a large white bandage over the injured ear.
At the convention, the former president honored Comperatore, a volunteer firefighter who officials said protected his wife and children from the gunfire in his final moments.
Trump’s reaction to the shooting – standing and raising his right fist while mouthing “Fight” to the Butler crowd as the Secret Service rushed him off stage – became a rallying cry at the Republican convention and in his campaign appearances since.
Trump and his allies used the Republican convention to deliver calls for unity in the wake of the assassination attempt. However, in his speech on the convention’s final night, Trump returned to familiar attacks on Democratic rivals, and has repeated those attacks in campaign rallies since then.
“What a day it will be – fight, fight, fight!” Trump said Friday in his social media post announcing the Butler rally.
FBI Director Christopher Wray told lawmakers in a Wednesday hearing on Capitol Hill that there was “some question” whether Trump was hit by a bullet or shrapnel.
“No, it was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,” Trump wrote Thursday on Truth Social. “No wonder the once storied FBI has lost the confidence of America!”
The FBI said Thursday that investigators are continuing to examine bullet fragments and other evidence in the attack on Trump, but the agency has always considered the shooting an attempted assassination of the former president.
US Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned this week amid scrutiny of security lapses related to the assassination attempt. The move came as lawmakers and an internal government watchdog move forward with investigations into the agency’s handling of Trump’s protection and how the gunman came close to the killing the Republican presidential candidate.
“In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that, I have made the difficult decision to step down as your Director,” Cheatle wrote in her resignation letter. She acknowledged that on the day of the shooting, the agency “fell short” of its mission “to protect our nation’s leaders.”
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2024 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
