Former US President Donald Trump is planning to stop holding campaign rallies outdoors in the wake of the 13 July assassination attempt, as per a report in Newsweek. The team of the Republican contender for 2024 has stated that campaigning will be held indoors for security reasons. Mr Trump might still make an appearance at smaller outdoor rallies, but they will take place in places like stadiums with strictly restricted admissions.

Notably, Mr Trump has hosted hundreds of outdoor rallies since he announced his presidential campaign. For his fans and supporters, these events have taken on the character of festivals, complete with parties and vendors selling campaign memorabilia and products.

The move, which was first reported by the Washington Post, coincides with the resignation of Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the Secret Service, on Tuesday. Ms Cheatle was subjected to a hostile grilling by both Democrats and Republicans before a congressional committee over apparent security lapses before a 20-year-old gunman’s attempt on Mr Trump’s life.

In a letter of resignation, Ms Cheatle stated she had decided to leave the agency “with a heavy heart,” citing the Butler rally as the reason it “fell short” of the agency’s mandate to “protect our nation’s leaders.”

According to the Washington Post report, Mr Trump’s team informed the Secret Service that the 2024 re-election campaign intended to host big events and would require more resources and security. However, it is believed that the agency rejected the requests due to a shortage of funding.

Meanwhile, the 45th US President was hit in the ear in an assassination bid by a gunman at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania today. Blood was visible on his cheeks and mouth. The shooter was identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks. He has been killed. A spectator was also killed in the shooting and two others were “critically” injured, officials said.

The 78-year-old Republican presidential contender, whose team claimed he was “fine,” was attacked shortly as he began his speech. “I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin,” Mr Trump said on his Truth Social account.

Washington:

Donald Trump was facing a backlash Thursday after declining to pledge he will accept the results of the 2024 presidential election if he loses, as he repeated his false claims that he was cheated in the 2020 vote.

“If everything’s honest, I’d gladly accept the results,” the Republican former president told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Wednesday. “If it’s not, you have to fight for the right of the country.”

Trump — who is running for a return to the White House, in what will almost certainly be a re-run of his 2020 face-off with Joe Biden — made similar remarks ahead of the last two presidential elections.

He told the Sentinel he would “let it be known” if he thought there were problems.

“I’d be doing a disservice to the country if I said otherwise,” he said. “But no, I expect an honest election and we expect to win maybe very big.”

Trump equivocated when asked recently by Time Magazine if his defeat in November would spark political violence, and his latest remarks prompted a withering response from the Biden camp.

“Bottom line: Trump is a danger to the constitution and a threat to our democracy,” campaign spokesman James Singer said in a statement.

“The American people are going to give him another electoral defeat this November because they continue to reject his extremism, his affection for violence, and his thirst for revenge.”

Trump is facing dozens of felony charges over an alleged criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election — culminating in the storming of the US Capitol by his supporters — that was based on his false claims of voter fraud.

The former president continues to make baseless claims that the White House was stolen from him in 2020, repeatedly and falsely alleging at two rallies as recently as Wednesday that Democrats had committed widespread voter fraud.

“The radical left Democrats rigged the presidential election in 2020 and we’re not going to allow them to rig the presidential election in 2024. We won’t have a country left,” Trump thundered in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)