What we know
- Former President Donald Trump was injured in an assassination attempt at a campaign rally yesterday in Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump, who emerged with a bloodied face, said he was shot in the ear and described feeling a “bullet ripping through the skin.” He arrived in Milwaukee tonight for the Republican National Convention.
- President Joe Biden, speaking from the Oval Office implored Americans to stop viewing their political opponents as enemies: "It's time to cool it down."
- The FBI is investigating the shooting as an act of domestic terrorism. A motive is still not known for the deceased shooter, identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.
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Vice President Harris extends condolences to man killed at Trump rally
Vice President Kamala Harris said in a post on X that she and second gentleman Doug Emhoff "extend our deepest condolences to the family of Corey Comperatore," the rally attendee who was killed.
"He was a husband, father, and firefighter who was shielding his family from gunfire," she said in the post. "Our hearts break for this loss from yesterday’s abhorrent violence."
Biden campaign to resume 'drawing the contrast' with Trump after tomorrow's NBC News interview
A Biden campaign official indicated that the campaign would return to the cycle's activities after his interview with NBC News tomorrow.
The official said that "both the DNC and the campaign will continue drawing the contrast between our positive vision for the future and Trump and Republicans’ backwards-looking agenda over the course of the week."
Witnesses describe lack of security in lot that backed up to Trump rally
BUTLER, Pa. — Two women who watched former President Donald Trump’s rally yesterday from a neighboring property described what they called lax safety measures beyond the event’s security perimeter.
Valerie Fennell and Deb Kuminkoski had tickets to go to the rally, but, because of the heat and the large crowd, they decided to hang back and watch from Fennell’s backyard, which backs up to the area where the rally was held.
Fennell’s backyard is in a grassy area between where the Trump crowd gathered and the AGR factory where the shooter was perched on the roof of one of the buildings, about 150 yards away.
The shooter’s bullets soared right over their heads on their way toward Trump and his supporters as they watched the event, they said.
Jill Biden spoke with Melania Trump today
First lady Jill Biden spoke with former first lady Melania Trump by phone this afternoon, a White House official said.
RNC Committeeman David Bossie: 'The plan is [the VP pick] is imminent'
Republican National Committeeman David Bossie told Milwaukee's WISN-TV this evening that he expects Trump to receive a "very emotional and overwhelming" welcome tomorrow night and that he believes Trump will announce his vice presidential nominee imminently.
"I don’t get ahead of [Trump,]" Bossie said, adding, "But I think the plan is it’s imminent for certain."
He also confirmed that Trump would be speaking tomorrow, saying he is "going to be seen in Milwaukee tomorrow."
Witnesses describe lack of security in lot that backed up to Trump rally
BUTLER, Pa. — Two women who watched former President Donald Trump’s rally yesterday from a neighboring property described what they called lax safety measures beyond the event’s security perimeter.
Valerie Fennell and Deb Kuminkoski had tickets to go to the Butler rally, but, because of the heat and the large crowd, they decided to hang back and watch from Fennell’s backyard, which backs up to the area where the rally was held.
At protest kickoff, attendees say assassination attempt doesn't change nature of protests
At a concert kickoff event for the main protests scheduled to take place against the Republican convention tomorrow, attendees rejected any notion that the attack on Trump should mute their efforts.
Several at the Coalition to March on the RNC event said that they’d always planned to protest various policies pushed by Trump and his allies — and that their focus was no different after the attempted assassination.
“They’ve laid it all out there. The whole thing with Project 2025,” said Zach, a guitarist and singer for the band Pillärs, which is one of several that played at the event.
Zach said he drove in from Cleveland to play with his band for free at the event.
“Anyone who’s been paying any remote attention to the policies that were enacted in the first go-around," a reference to the first Trump administration, should be “alarmed,” he said.
And now, he said, “they have been very specific and they’ve been very articulate with what they want to see” on issues like immigration and reproductive rights.
“There’s an old saying, right? When somebody tells you what they’re going to do, believe them. So I’m taking them at their word.”
Main leftist RNC protest expecting 5,000 people tomorrow
Omar Flores, the lead organizer of the Coalition to March on the RNC, the leftist group planning a major protest effort at the Republican National Convention, said he expects about 5,000 people at his group’s march tomorrow.
At a protest kickoff concert in Milwaukee tonight, Flores said the group hadn’t made any changes to its protest march tomorrow — despite heightened worries following the assassination attempt on Trump — and had also not been in contact with law enforcement or Milwaukee officials about any added security measures.
Rather, Flores said several members of the group had received both formal and informal training in de-escalation that he said would be useful if counterprotesters show up.
“Counterprotesters are genuinely nothing new — even ones that are carrying arms,” he said. “And we’ve always been able to de-escalate those situations. We have it down to a science at this point.”
“We’re not going in naive. We prepared the best that we can for the worst, but we’re expecting the best,” Flores said.
Photographer at rally says bullet took out 'little piece' of Trump's ear
Paul Kosko, an amateur photographer who took photos at Trump's rally, said he noticed from his photos that a bullet took out part of Trump's ear.
"When the bullet struck, it took out a little piece of the president's right upper ear," Kosko said in an interview, saying he noticed the detail when he zoomed in on his photos.
Trump says he plans to rewrite RNC speech in light of shooting
In what appears to be his first interview since yesterday's shooting, Trump told the Washington Examiner that he will completely rewrite the speech he planned to give Thursday at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee and said, "This is a chance to bring the whole country, even the whole world, together."
"The speech will be a lot different, a lot different than it would’ve been two days ago," he added.
Despite Trump's decision to change his speech ahead of the convention, several speakers scheduled to address GOP delegates told NBC News that they were asked to change nothing about their planned speeches.