Biden, Trump urge calm after assassination attempt

Donald Trump survived assassination attempt

Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt on Saturday

(Image credit: Rebecca Droke / AFP via Getty Images)

What happened

The 20-year-old gunman who grazed Donald Trump's ear and fatally shot an attendee at a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday appeared to have acted alone with no clear motive, the FBI said yesterday.

President Joe Biden urged America to "lower the temperature in our politics" in a Sunday evening televised Oval Office address. Trump told the Washington Examiner that following the assassination attempt, he reworked his upcoming "humdinger" of a Republican National Convention speech to "bring the whole country" together.

Who said what

"Disagreement is inevitable in American democracy," but "politics must never be a literal battlefield or, God forbid, a literal killing field," Biden said. "In America we resolve our differences at the ballot box." He said he'd had a "short but good conversation" with Trump after the shooting and was "sincerely grateful" he was "doing well and recovering." In a social media post minutes after Biden's speech, Trump said, "UNITE AMERICA!"

The gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, who was shot dead by Secret Service snipers, used an AR-style rifle legally purchased by his father, the FBI said. Crooks had no known mental health issues and wasn't on law enforcement's radar. He was a registered Republican who had donated $15 to a liberal political group in 2021 and belonged to a shooting club near his Pittsburgh suburb of Bethel Park, where he worked in a nursing home. Former high school classmates described Crooks as a bright, socially awkward loner who was not overtly political but appeard to be conservative-leaning. The man he killed, 50-year-old Corey Comperatore, died while shielding his wife and daughter, officials said.

What next?

Trump arrived in Milwaukee on Sunday for this week's Republican National Convention. He is scheduled to accept the GOP presidential nomination on Thursday.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.