This past weekend, an attempt was made on the life of former President Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. The would be assassin’s bullet tore across Trump’s right ear. An inch to the right and Donald Trump would be dead. A fire captain sitting behind and to the left of the podium was killed and two other spectators were critically injured. One report said that the assassin fired eight shots from his AR-15 semi-automatic rifle from the top of a nearby building.
There have been four presidents assassinated in our nation’s history: Lincoln in 1865; Garfield in 1881; McKinley in 1901; and Kennedy in 1963. Since JFK’s assassination in Dallas, there have been repeated attacks on presidents or candidates. Kennedy’s younger brother Bob was killed during the 1968 campaign, just after winning the Democratic Primary election in California. George Wallace was campaigning in 1972 when an assassin gunned him down in Maryland; he survived but was paralyzed. Two attempts were made on President Ford’s life in 1975 but he escaped unscathed. The last before this weekend was the wounding of Ronald Reagan in March of 1981, shortly after he took office.