![Donald Trump xBUTLER, PENNSYLVANIA - JULY 13: Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is rushed offstage by U.S. Secret Service agents after being grazed by a bullet during a rally on July 13, 2024 in Butler, Pennsylvania. Butler County district attorney Richard Goldinger said the shooter is dead after injuring former U.S. President Donald Trump, killing one audience member and injuring another in the shooting.](https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2024/07/GettyImages-2161925705-3-e1722012022191.jpg?fit=crop&ar=16%3A9&w=2048&auto=format&ixlib=react-9.3.0)
A New York Times analysis of the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump published on Friday disputed recent speculation that Trump was only hit by shrapnel and not by one of the shooter’s bullets.
Some on the Left have called on Trump to prove that his would-be assassin’s bullet struck his right ear after FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress on Wednesday that “there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel.” The Times analyzed “bullet trajectories, footage, photos and audio,” which the newspaper said “indicates a bullet, not debris, wounded the former president.”
The footage was also reviewed by Montana State University audio forensics expert Rob Maher.
“A key piece of evidence in The Times’s analysis is a live video feed that captures Mr. Trump’s reaction as the first three gunshots are fired,” the newspaper reported. “The crack of the bullets are heard as they pass the microphone that Mr. Trump speaks into. Almost a second elapses between the first and second shots.”
New York Times does detailed analysis of bullet trajectories, video, photos, and audio of shooting at Trump rally. They conclude Trump was most likely grazed by the first of eight bullets fired by the gunman, and not shrapnel or something else. pic.twitter.com/wTg87GXylc
— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) July 26, 2024
Maher said that Trump is seen reaching for his ear between the sound of the first and second shots. The analysis indicated that the 20-year-old gunman fired eight shots in total, a volley of three shots followed by a volley of five. The first of the eight shots fired by the shooter appeared to hit the bleachers on Trump’s left after hitting his ear. Firefighter and father Corey Comperatore, who was killed in the shooting, appeared to have been struck in the shooter’s second round of shots.
“What appears to have put Mr. Comperatore in the line of fire is that the gunman may have been adjusting his aim lower as Secret Service agents protectively took Mr. Trump to the ground,” the Times reported.
Trump blasted FBI Director Wray after he suggested the former president could’ve been hit by “shrapnel.”
“FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress yesterday that he wasn’t sure if I was hit by shrapnel, glass, or a bullet (the FBI never even checked!), but he was sure that Crooked Joe Biden was physically and cognitively ‘uneventful’ – Wrong!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“No, it was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,” he added. “The hospital called it a ‘bullet wound to the ear,’ and that is what it was. No wonder the once storied FBI has lost the confidence of America!”
Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle was grilled by lawmakers on Capitol Hill on Monday about the apparent security in her agency’s protection of the former president that allowed the 20-year-old shooter to gain access to a roof just 130 yards away from the rally stage. Cheatle admitted the Secret Service “failed” to protect Trump at his rally on July 13. She resigned on Tuesday.
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