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US politics – Blood on the campaign trail, redux
A second assassination attempt on Trump’s life is only the latest in a series of attacks on US presidential candidates.
By Danylo Hawaleshka
Published On 17 Sep 202417 Sep 2024
History Illustrated is a series of perspectives that puts news events and current affairs into historical context using graphics generated with artificial intelligence.
In the US, neither a sitting president, nor anyone gunning for the job, is ever spared the worry of being targeted by a would-be assassin, given four presidents have been assassinated to date.
Now, a second attempt on Donald Trump’s life in two months has been made while he was golfing, only the latest in a string of attempts against a US presidential candidate.
On October 14, 1912, Theodore Roosevelt was running for the White House as the candidate for the Progressive Party during a raucous campaign in which the former president had split from the Republicans.
Shortly before taking the stage in Milwaukee, he was shot in the chest, but his folded 50-page speech, and a steel eyeglass case, slowed the bullet. He refused treatment despite a bullet in his lung, and instead delivered his address. Despite a surge in public sympathy, Roosevelt lost to Democrat Woodrow Wilson because of the split in the Republican vote.
In 1968, Robert Kennedy was in Los Angeles, trailing his rival, Hubert Humphrey, in a close race for the Democratic presidential nomination. Kennedy had just won the California primary, when he was shot dead. Humphrey would end up running for the Democrats but eventually lost to Richard Nixon.
Only four years later, in 1972, Alabama Governor George Wallace was seen as the likely winner in the race to secure the Democratic nomination. He was campaigning in Maryland, and hecklers had thrown rocks and tomatoes at the one-time segregationist.
On May 15, at one of his campaign stops, Wallace was shot four times, leaving him paralysed. The next day, while in hospital, he won primaries in Michigan and Maryland, but the shooting would end his presidential campaign.
Now, it’s happened again. On Sunday, September 15, Donald Trump was at his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida, when the Secret Service shot at an armed suspect. The man escaped in an SUV. Police later arrested Ryan Wesley Routh, 58.
Trump was unhurt. With Trump safe and a suspect in custody, many observers are now asking whether he or his opponent, Kamala Harris, will be willing to take on one of the most decisive issues in American politics. Gun control.
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