FBI agents visit a residence next to a home connected to Cole Tomas Allen, who was identified as the suspect at the White House Correspondents Dinner shooting, in Torrance, Calif., on April 26, 2026. Photo: San Francisco Chronicle via AP

Secret service agents respond during the White House Correspondents Dinner, in Washington on April 25, 2026.
| Photo Credit: AP

Washington:

The U.S. Secret Service said on Monday it was aware of a post by billionaire Elon Musk’s on the X social media platform musing about a lack of assassination attempts on President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

Musk, who owns the platform, formerly known as Twitter, put up the post after a man suspected of planning to assassinate former President Donald Trump at his golf course in West Palm Beach was arrested on Sunday.

A Trump supporter and the CEO of Tesla, Musk wrote on Sunday: “And no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala,” a post he ended with an emoji of a face with a raised eyebrow.

He was quickly criticized by X users from the left and right, who said they were concerned his words to his nearly 200 million X followers could incite violence against Biden and Harris.

Musk deleted the post but not before the Secret Service, tasked with protecting current and former presidents, vice presidents and other notable officials, took notice.

“The Secret Service is aware of the social media post made by Elon Musk and as a matter of practice, we do not comment on matters involving protective intelligence,” a spokesperson told Reuters in an email. “We can say, however, that the Secret Service investigates all threats related to our protectees.”

The spokesperson declined to specify whether the agency had reached out to Musk, who seemed to suggest in follow-up posts that he had been making a joke.

“Well, one lesson I’ve learned is that just because I say something to a group and they laugh doesn’t mean it’s going to be all that hilarious as a post on X,” he wrote. “Turns out that jokes are WAY less funny if people don’t know the context and the delivery is plain text.”

Harris, a Democrat running against the Republican Trump in the 2024 election, and Biden both issued statements on Sunday night expressing relief that Trump had not been harmed.

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

Washington:

The FBI is investigating what it said was another assassination attempt on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

The incident occurred Sunday at the Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach in Florida where Trump, the former president, was golfing.

Law enforcement officials said Secret Service saw a man with a rifle in the bushes and shot at the suspected assassin.

The suspect fled the bushes and was later apprehended on a highway, according to law enforcement.

PREVIOUS ATTEMPT ON TRUMP

In July, Trump was shot by a gunman during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania in what the FBI said was an attempted assassination. The former president was wounded in the ear.

The Congressional Research Service says direct assaults against presidents, presidents-elect, and candidates have occurred on at least 15 separate occasions, with five resulting in death.

Below is a list of other previous attempts on the lives of American leaders, successful or not.

ASSASSINATIONS

Four US presidents were assassinated while in office.

Abraham Lincoln: Killed in 1865 by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington.

James Garfield: Shot in 1881 in Washington at a train station and died of his wounds two and a half months later.

William McKinley: Assassinated in 1901 by an anarchist in Buffalo, New York.

John F Kennedy: Assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in 1963 in Dallas, Texas, as the president rode in a motorcade.

LEADERS WHO SURVIVED ASSASSINATION ATTEMPTS

Four presidents were wounded but survived assassination attempts, while in office or afterwards.

Donald Trump: Trump had just started a campaign speech in Pennsylvania on July 13 when shots rang out. Trump was shot in the ear. He was rushed by security officials to a black SUV.

Ronald Reagan: He was shot in 1981 outside the Hilton Hotel in Washington. Reagan was wounded when one of the bullets ricocheted off a limousine and struck him under the left armpit.

President Gerald Ford: Survived two attempts on his life in less than three weeks in 1975 without being hurt.

Theodore Roosevelt: He was shot in the chest in 1912 while campaigning for election in Milwaukee, but insisted on delivering his speech to supporters before being taken to a hospital.

ASSASSINATION ATTEMPTS ON OTHER US LEADERS

Robert F. Kennedy: A US presidential candidate, and a US senator, Kennedy was assassinated in 1968 by a gunman in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Alabama Governor George C. Wallace: A candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, he was shot in 1972 and became paralysed from the waist down.

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

Nearly two weeks after Donald Trump’s near assassination, the FBI confirmed on July 26 that it was indeed a bullet that struck the former President’s ear, moving to clear up conflicting accounts about what caused the former President’s injuries after a gunman opened fire at a Pennsylvania rally.

“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle,” the agency said in a statement.

The one-sentence statement from the FBI marked the most definitive law enforcement account of Trump’s injuries and followed ambiguous comments earlier in the week from Director Christopher Wray that appeared to cast doubt on whether Trump had actually been hit by a bullet.

The comment drew fury from Trump and his allies and further stoked conspiracy theories that have flourished on both sides of the political aisle amid a dearth of information following the July 13 attack.

Up until now, federal law enforcement agents involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, had refused to provide information about what caused Trump’s injuries. Trump’s campaign has also declined to release medical records from the hospital where he was first treated or to make the doctors there available for questions.

Updates have instead come either from Trump himself or from Trump’s former White House doctor, Ronny Jackson, a staunch ally who now represents Texas in Congress. Though Jackson has been treating Trump since the night of the attack, he has come under considerable scrutiny and is not Trump’s primary care physician.

The FBI’s apparent reluctance to immediately vouch for the former President’s version of events has also raised fresh tension between the Republican nominee and the nation’s premier federal law enforcement agency, which he could soon exert control over once again. Trump and his supporters have for years accused federal law enforcement of being weaponized against him, something Wray has consistently denied.

Speaking at an event later Friday in West Palm Beach Florida, Trump drew boos from the crowd when he described the suggestion that he may have been struck by glass or shrapnel instead of a bullet.

“Did you see the FBI today apologized?” he asked. “It just never ends with these people. … We accept their apology.”

Trump appeared on July 26 for the first time without a bandage on his right ear. Photographs and video showed no sign of continued bleeding, and no distinct holes or gashes.

Questions about the extent and nature of Trump’s wound began immediately after the attack, as his campaign and law enforcement officials declined to answer questions about his condition or the treatment he received after Trump narrowly escaped death in an attempted assassination by a gunman with a high-powered rifle.

Those questions have persisted despite photographs showing the trace of a projectile speeding past Trump’s head as well as Trump’s teleprompter glass intact after the shooting, and the account Trump himself gave in a Truth Social post within hours of the shooting that he had been “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”

“I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin,” he wrote.

Days later, in a speech accepting the nomination at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Trump recounted the scene in detail, while wearing a large gauze bandage over his right ear.

“I heard a loud whizzing sound and felt something hit me really, really hard, on my right ear. I said to myself, ‘Wow, what was that? It can only be a bullet,’” he said.

“If I had not moved my head at that very last instant,” Trump said, “the assassin’s bullet would have perfectly hit its mark, and I would not be here tonight.”

But the first medical account of Trump’s condition didn’t come until a full week after the shooting, when Jackson released his first letter last Saturday evening. In it, he said the bullet that struck Trump had “produced a 2 cm wide wound that extended down to the cartilaginous surface of the ear.” He also revealed Trump had received a CT scan at the hospital.

Federal law enforcement involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, had declined to confirm that account. And Wray’s testimony offered apparently conflicting answers on the issue.

“There’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that hit his ear,” Wray said, before he seemed to suggest it was indeed a bullet.

“I don’t know whether that bullet, in addition to causing the grazing, could have also landed somewhere else,” he said.

On July 25, the FBI sought to clarify matters with a statement affirming that the shooting was an “attempted assassination of former President Trump which resulted in his injury, as well as the death of a heroic father and the injuries of several other victims.” The FBI also said Thursday that its Shooting Reconstruction Team continues to examine bullet fragments and other evidence from the scene.

Jackson, who has been treating the former President since the night of the July 13 shooting, told The Associated Press on July 25 that any suggestion Trump’s ear was bloodied by anything other than a bullet was reckless.

“It was a bullet wound,” said Jackson. “You can’t make statements like that. It leads to all these conspiracy theories.”

In his letter on July 26, Jackson insisted “there is absolutely no evidence” Trump was struck by anything other than a bullet and said it was “wrong and inappropriate to suggest anything else.”

He wrote that at Butler Memorial Hospital, where the GOP nominee was rushed after the shooting, he was evaluated and treated for a “Gunshot Wound to the Right Ear.”

“Having served as an Emergency Medicine physician for over 20 years in the United States Navy, including as a combat physician on the battlefield in Iraq,” he wrote, “I have treated many gunshot wounds in my career. Based on my direct observations of the injury, my relevant clinical background, and my significant experience evaluating and treating patients with similar wounds, I completely concur with the initial assessment and treatment provided by the doctors at nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital on the day of the shooting.”

The FBI declined to comment on the Jackson letters.

Asked if the campaign would release those hospital records, or allow the doctors who treated him there to speak, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung blasted the media for asking.

“The media has no shame in engaging in disgusting conspiracy theories,” he said. “The facts are the facts, and to question an abhorrent assassination attempt that ultimately cost a life and injured two others is beyond the pale.”

In emails last week, he told the AP that “medical readouts” had already been provided.

“It’s sad some people still don’t believe a shooting happened,” Cheung said, “even after one person was killed and others were injured.”

Anyone who believes the conspiracies, he added, “is either mentally deficient or willfully peddling falsehoods for political reasons.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a close Trump ally, also urged Wray to correct his testimony in a letter on July 26, saying the fact Trump had been hit by a bullet “was made clear in briefings my office received and should not be a point of contention.”

“As head of the FBI, you should not be creating confusion about such matters, as it further undercuts the agency’s credibility with millions of Americans,” he wrote.

Trump also lashed out at Wray in a post on his Truth Social network, saying it was “No wonder the once storied FBI has lost the confidence of America!”

“No, it was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,” he wrote.

On Friday, he called Wray’s comments “so damaging to the Great People that work in the FBI.”

Jackson has encountered significant scrutiny over the years.

After administering a physical to Trump in 2018, he drew headlines for suggesting that “if he had a healthier diet over the last 20 years, he might live to be 200 years old.”

He was reportedly demoted by the Navy after the Department of Defense inspector general released a scathing report on his conduct as a top White House physician that found Jackson had made “sexual and denigrating” comments about a female subordinates and took prescription-strength sleeping medication that prompted worries from his colleagues about his ability to provide proper medical care.

Trump appointed Wray as FBI director in 2017 to replace the fired James Comey. But the then-President swiftly soured on his hire as the bureau continued its investigation into the Russian election interference.

Trump flirted openly with the idea of firing Wray as his term drew to a close, and he lashed out anew after the FBI executed a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to recover boxes of classified documents from his presidency.

Grand Rapids:

Donald Trump will hold his first campaign rally on Saturday since he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt one week ago and fresh from his nominating convention where his takeover of the Republican Party was cemented.

Trump will appear in Grand Rapids, in the battleground state of Michigan, along with his new vice presidential pick, Ohio U.S. Senator J.D. Vance. It will be their first campaign event together as the now official Republican presidential ticket.

Republican Party officials said during Trump’s nominating convention in Milwaukee this week that his brush with death last Saturday had changed him, and that when he made his acceptance speech on Thursday night he would call for national unity.

While Trump began the address with a call for unity and national healing, much of his speech was his well-known list of grievances and attacks on opponents.

It is unclear what type of a speech Trump will deliver on Saturday, but his diehard supporters typically flock to such events to hear Trump’s more traditional inflammatory rhetoric.

Trump and Vance will take the stage in Grand Rapids with the Republican Party unified behind them after this week’s nominating convention. In contrast, the Democrats are in turmoil and it is no longer certain that President Joe Biden will be the Democratic nominee facing Trump in the Nov. 5 election.

Biden is facing mounting calls from many elected officials in his own party to step aside as the party’s White House candidate and to end his re-election bid, after his poor debate performance against Trump last month.

Biden is trailing in opinion polls and is behind in every swing state against Trump. Many Democrats fear he may have virtually no path to victory and that the party needs a new presidential candidate to take on Trump.

The rally in Grand Rapids will be in an indoor arena, unlike the event in Butler, Pennsylvania last weekend, which was outdoors. At that event, the gunman was able to scale the roof of a building outside the Secret Service perimeter before opening fire on Trump, clipping his ear, killing a rally-goer and wounding several others.

The U.S. Secret Service, which is responsible for protecting Trump, declined to comment on security for the Grand Rapids event. An investigation is under way into the security failures at the Butler rally.

“The Secret Service does not discuss the means and methods used for our protective operations,” the agency said in a statement.

Trump gave a detailed account of his narrow brush with death in his convention speech on Thursday, telling the audience that he was only talking to them “by the grace of Almighty God.”

(Reporting by Tim Reid in Grand Rapids, editing by Ross Colvin and Alistair Bell)

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

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
| Photo Credit: AP

President Joe Biden has directed the U.S. Secret Service to protect independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, the Homeland Security secretary said on June 15.

Mr. Kennedy is a longshot to win Electoral College votes, much less the presidency. But his campaign events have drawn large crowds of supporters and people interested in his message.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said Mr. Biden had directed the protection for Mr. Kennedy “both prior to and after the events of this past weekend.”

The Secret Service is legally required to protect major party presidential and vice presidential candidates and their families 120 days out from a general election, but third-party candidates are on an as-needed basis.

The Department of Homeland Security acknowledged in its 2024 budget overview that recent requests for candidate protection were coming in earlier than in the past.

Threats to political candidates are common, but law enforcement officials have said that there has been an uptick in violent rhetoric since the weekend attack at the Trump rally. Mayorkas said both Biden and Trump are “constantly the subject of threats.”

“We are in a heightened and very dynamic threat environment,” he said.

With a famous name and a loyal base, Mr. Kennedy has the potential to do better than any third-party presidential candidate since Ross Perot in the 1990s. But he didn’t participate in the first presidential debate on June 27. Both the Biden and Trump campaigns, who fear he could be a spoiler, bypassed the nonpartisan debate commission and agreed to a schedule that essentially left out Mr. Kennedy.

Mr. Kennedy, who last year challenged Mr. Biden for the Democratic nomination before launching an independent bid, has argued that his relatively strong showing in a few national polls gives his candidacy heft. Polls during the 2016 presidential campaign regularly put libertarian Gary Johnson’s support in the high single or low double digits, but he ultimately received only about 3% of the vote nationwide.

Trump became the official Republican presidential nominee on Monday after receiving the votes of enough delegates at the Republican National Convention. He was not seriously injured in the shooting over the weekend in Pennsylvania. There is an independent review of the attack.

Mayorkas said Trump’s protection has been enhanced based on the “evolving nature of the threats to the former president” and his shift from presumptive nominee to nominee.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is seen with blood on his face surrounded by secret service agents as he is taken off the stage at a campaign event at Butler Farm Show Inc. in Butler, Pennsylvania, July 13, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Facing growing criticism over a massive security failure, the U.S. Secret Service on July 15 vowed to cooperate with an independent review after a shooter was allowed to open fire on Donald Trump.

The 78-year-old former president was injured but survived an assassination attempt at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, a brazen attack that shocked a nation already deeply polarized ahead of the November election.

“The Secret Service is working with all involved Federal, state and local agencies to understand what happened, how it happened, and how we can prevent an incident like this from ever taking place again,” the agency’s director Kimberly Cheatle said in a statement.

“We understand the importance of the independent review announced by President (Joe) Biden yesterday and will participate fully,” Mr. Cheatle added.

Trump was speaking at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania when multiple bangs rang out.

He clutched his ear, with blood visible on his ear and cheek, then ducked to the floor as Secret Service agents swarmed onto the podium, surrounding him and rushing him to a nearby vehicle.

The shooter and a bystander were killed, and two spectators injured.

Mr. Biden ordered a full review of security at the rally, as well as at this week’s Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Trump will be crowned the party’s presidential nominee.

He also ordered Secret Service protection for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer and long-time vaccine skeptic who has no chance of winning in November, but whose candidacy could potentially sway close contests in key swing states.

Editorial | Dodging bullets: On an assassination bid and U.S. politics

Heightened risk

The Secret Service faces intense scrutiny over how a gunman aiming an assault rifle was able to take position on a roof some 500 feet (150 meters) from one of the most protected political figures on the planet.

And the questions grew louder when phone footage emerged of people sighting the gunman and trying to warn security before he opened fire.

With Trump set to star at the convention, Ms. Cheatle said the agency was working to toughen security.

The Secret Service designs plans for major events “to respond to a kinetic security environment and the most up-to-date intelligence,” her statement said.

Earlier in the day, Trump had called for Secret Service protection Kennedy Jr. “in light of what is going on in the world today.”

“Given the history of the Kennedy Family, this is the obvious right thing to do!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social web site.

Mr. Kenedy’s uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas in 1963. Five years later, the candidate’s father, Robert, was shot to death in Los Angeles.

The U.S. Secret Service is responsible for the safety of the president, vice president and former presidents, and their families, as well as major election candidates and visiting foreign heads of state.

Police officers stand watch outside the home of 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, named by the FBI as the “subject involved” in the attempted assassination of former U.S. President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The FBI said on July 15 it has gained access to the phone of the Thomas Matthew Crooks, the suspect in the shooting of former President Donald Trump, as it continues to investigate his motive for the crime.

The FBI stressed that its investigation into Saturday’s shooting, which is being treated as both an assassination attempt and potential domestic terrorism, is still in its early stages.

“FBI technical specialists successfully gained access to Thomas Matthew Crooks’ phone, and they continue to analyze his electronic devices,” the FBI said in a statement.

“The search of the subject’s residence and vehicle are complete.”

The bureau added that it has conducted nearly 100 interviews with law enforcement personnel, event attendees and other witnesses.

In a call with reporters on Sunday, FBI officials said they had still not yet been able to attribute an ideology or find evidence of a motive for the shooting.

The AR-style 556 rifle used by the shooter was legally purchased by his father and officials said there was no indication that the suspect suffered from any mental health issues.

They added that a preliminary review of recent calls and texts by the shooter did not shed any light on his motive, or on whether others may have had prior knowledge of his plans.

Trump’s right ear was grazed by a bullet in the shooting at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania in which one supporter was killed and two others were wounded before Secret Service agents shot dead 20-year-old Crooks. (Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; additional reporting by Rami Ayyub and Eric Beech Editing by Alistair Bell)

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is rushed offstage during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

As Europe woke up to the news of the attempted assassination of former U.S. President Donald Trump, its leaders took to social media to condemn the attack.

Trump rally shooting live updates

The U.K.’s new Prime Minister, Keir Starmer said he was “appalled” by the attack.

“Political violence in any form has no place in our societies and my thoughts are with all the victims of this attack,” Mr Starmer wrote on social media site X.

“My thoughts are with President Donald Trump, the victim of an assassination attempt,” French President Emmanuel Macron wrote. “ It is a tragedy for our democracies. France shares the shock and indignation of the American people,” he said.

Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the attack “despicable”.

“Political violence has no place in a democracy,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

“My thoughts and prayers are with President Donald Trump in these dark hours, “ Hungarian Prime Minister and Trump ally, Viktor Orban said.