Name: How Trump Shooting Shifted Democratic and Republican Election Strategies | WSJ
Uploaded: 2024-07-18T09:41:50.000Z
Duration: 7 min 27 s
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In the aftermath of the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump, the Republican National Convention is kicking off.

The shooting marked a shocking new chapter of violence in modern American politics and transformed the rhetoric and campaign strategies in the presidential race.

The rhetoric from the left was what charged the shooter.

I thank God that his hand was on President Trump.

A lot of Republicans blame the Democrats directly for this shooting, even though we don't know the case of this particular shooter, what his motivations were.

Here's a closer look at how the attack has changed the presidential race.

The assassination attempt on Donald Trump obviously came in the context of what was already a very heightened and tense political climate.

The fact that both nominees are so unpopular, that has inspired both parties to raise the stakes of the election and to frame it as an existential choice, a fork in the road for the country.

I mean, there's no figure in American history, at least in the modern era, maybe since Lincoln, who's been so vilified and really persecuted.

A lot of Republicans blame the Democrats saying that by casting the election in such by referring to Trump as a dictator, comparing him to Adolf Hitler, that they struck fear in the hearts of their followers and encouraged or inspired many people on the left to view Trump as an enemy of the republic and therefore to want to potentially take him out.

When someone is demonized to the extent that Trump was being demonized, you're putting a target on them.

It's one side that is going after Donald Trump in a way to demonize him personally.

The left seems to have targeted Donald Trump as a person.

One of the first to point fingers was the man we now know is Donald Trump's running mate, Senator J.D.

Vance of Ohio, who even before we knew the identity of the man who fired the shot, was out there on social media saying this is the Democrats' fault.

The rhetoric of the left was directly responsible for this tragic shooting.

Biden's campaign has argued that Trump is a threat to democracy.

Trump's assault on democracy isn't just part of his past.

And Trump has used extreme rhetoric throughout his campaign.

So over the past few years, you've watched Biden and his band of Marxists, communists, fascists try to crush free speech, censor their critics, criminalize dissent, destroy attorney-client privilege.

For Democrats, this is all a bit much coming from the party of Donald Trump, who has been, I think it's fair to say, enthusiastic about political violence for much of his career in politics.

From encouraging people to beat up protesters at his rallies.

You know what they used to do to guys like that when they were in a place like this?

They'd be carried out on a stretcher, folks.

To egging on the protesters who sacked the Capitol on January 6th, 2021.

And they say that it's Trump as much as anyone who's led to this kind of a climate.

Politicians on both sides of the aisle called for lowering the temperature of the rhetoric after the shooting.

You know, the political record in this country has gotten very heated.

Politics must never be a literal battlefield, and God forbid, a killing field.

The sentiments expressed by the president in his remarks just now were very noble, and I hope they follow them.

Because if they believe it, they will scale back the rhetoric.

The images of the shooting have galvanized Trump supporters.

That picture of him standing up with a bloody face, a fist in the air with an American flag behind it, that's an iconic picture that I think will last a generation.

If you strip the politics out of it, it really is just an incredible moment.

The presidential nominee being gunned down, coming within perhaps a quarter inch of losing his life.

And as he is being taken to safety by the Secret Service, he turns around, he raises his fist, and you can hear him saying, fight, fight, fight.

So I think for many people, particularly, of course, Trump supporters, this is an image that they're going to rally around, seeing Trump as a sort of a martyr figure, someone who's been victimized and persecuted, someone that they believe the administration and the left have come after again and again using all of the forces of the state and tried to eliminate in so many ways.

And they see him as this triumphant hero who's rising from that fight and encouraging his followers to keep up the fight.

The devil came to Pennsylvania holding a rifle, but an American lion got back up on his feet and he roared.

So this plays into Trump's entire narrative that the left is out to get him, that everything that he's ever been accused of is a manufactured narrative intended to eliminate him because he poses such a threat to the system, to the deep state, to the left.

For Trump's followers, who see him as this martyr figure, as almost a messianic figure, this is a very powerful image.

I personally believe that God intervened today, not just on behalf of President Trump, but on behalf of our country.

Many of the supporters that I talked to believe that they see God's hand working for Trump in this situation.

He's mentioned God many times in his social media posts since coming off that stage where he almost lost his life.

If you didn't believe in miracles before Saturday, you better be believing right now.

Our God still saves, he still delivers, and he still sets free.

And that bullet went just apparently a millimeter from doing real and permanent damage.

Trump is truly blessed by the hand of God being able to evade being assassinated.

The attempted assassination came at a crossroads in this year's already tumultuous presidential campaign.

Donald Trump has been the subject of four separate criminal indictments, a couple of civil cases as well.

And I think many of us expected that the campaign and the months leading up to the election would really be dominated by his legal issues.

Now the focus really has shifted to the very real victimization that he faced as the target of an attempted assassination, and to his performance in the presidential debate, which of course was so catastrophic for his opponent, President Biden.

Biden's campaign, meanwhile, quickly pulled television ads off the airwaves and paused official communications.

Dealing with everything we have to do with, look.

The attack also shifted focus away from his debate performance and some Democrats calling for him to step aside.

While the presidential race remains close nationally, a recent WSJ poll shows that Trump is leading by six points.

 Still, Election Day is months away, and it's unclear how the shooting will affect the final outcome.