The United States has in recent years witnessed a major spike in political violence. The second apparent attempt on former President Trump's life comes just weeks after he was grazed by a bullet and one person was killed by a guns and weapons enthusiast who was a registered Republican and donated to Democrats, and highlights how violence and threats are shaping this race.
I'm Nandita Bose, a White House Correspondent covering the 2024 presidential race and Vice President Kamala Harris's campaign.
After the first attempt on Trump's life, President Joe Biden tried and failed to defuse the situation, denouncing the attack as unacceptable political violence and pulling election ads attacking Trump. He said it was "a mistake" to have told his own supporters a week before that he wanted to "put Trump in a bull's-eye," in a private fundraiser. After the second apparent attempt on Trump's life, the administration is pushing for more Secret Service resources to protect Trump.
Trump points to Democrats' claim that he is a danger to democracy as a motive for the shootings, although he has been responsible for much of the most inflammatory rhetoric in the campaign. He is sticking with that rhetoric, part of a long political pattern of verbal attacks. Within hours of the apparent assassination attempt at his golf course in Florida, Trump's campaign sent out texts asking voters to contribute, as it did after the attack in Pennsylvania.
Trump's running mate JD Vance suggested that the fact there had been two attempts on Trump's life and none on Harris' was evidence that Democrats needed to tone down their rhetoric, while Trump's billionaire supporter Elon Musk went a step further in a since-deleted post that drew widespread criticism.
Trump and other Republicans have recently repeated lies about Haitian immigrants in Ohio that have led to a series of threats forcing the closure of school and public buildings. Some Trump fans are openly using threats and menace to target Democrats, aware there's no clear line about what level of verbal attack is legal or not.
Polling suggests that most Americans want a change: they agree that the country is too divided by politics, and many believe there will be post-election violence. Stopping that from happening is both candidates' responsibility in the weeks to come.
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