Blood streaked across President Donald Trump’s face as a bullet grazed his ear at a Butler, Pennsylvania, campaign rally. On July 13, 2024, a 20-year-old gunman, Thomas Crooks, unleashed chaos, killing firefighter Corey Comperatore and wounding others. Journalist Salena Zito, an eyewitness, captures the harrowing moment in her new book, weaving a tale of resilience and divine providence.
Fox News reported that Zito's book, "Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Heartland," chronicles the event and its aftermath. The narrative underscores Trump’s defiance and the crowd’s shock.
As shots rang out, Zito saw Trump clutch his ear and drop to the stage. Blood was visible, yet Trump’s quick reaction suggested he wasn’t gravely wounded. Zito, refusing to duck, absorbed the chaotic scene, including Trump’s peculiar insistence on retrieving his shoes.
Secret Service agents swarmed Trump, shielding him from further harm. They hustled him off the stage, but not before he resisted being rushed away. Trump later told Zito he felt a duty to project strength, representing not just himself but the presidency.
“I wasn’t Donald Trump in that moment,” he told Zito, emphasizing his role as a symbol of national resolve.
This stance, while risky, aimed to quell panic among supporters. The progressive obsession with demonizing Trump ignores this instinct to lead under fire.
Zito’s account reveals Trump’s head turn toward a chart onstage, a split-second move that likely spared him worse injury. The bullet struck only his upper ear, a near-miss Trump attributed to divine intervention. He called it “the hand of God,” a sentiment that resonates with heartland values scorned by coastal elites.
The next day, July 14, 2024, Trump phoned Zito seven times to check on her and her family. “He would go on to call me, it was a total of seven times that day,” Zito recalled. These conversations revealed a reflective Trump, grappling with his survival.
Trump told Zito he believed he was spared for a “higher purpose” beyond mere candidacy. “He was spared because he has been given a higher purpose than to just be a candidate for president,” Zito noted. This conviction, mocked by secular critics, reflects a faith-driven worldview that fuels his base.
Zito’s book paints Trump as a man undeterred by danger, refusing to cower despite the bloodshed around him. His insistence on staying composed, even as Secret Service urged haste, speaks to a resolve that progressive narratives can’t erase. The woke fixation on “toxic masculinity” fails to grasp this display of grit.
Corey Comperatore, a firefighter, lost his life shielding others, a sacrifice Trump honored in his talks with Zito. The rally’s violence exposed the stakes of a polarized nation, where political vitriol can turn deadly. Yet Trump’s focus remained on unity, not vengeance, a nuance lost on his detractors.
“I needed people to know that we go on, and we will always go on no matter what,” Trump told Zito. This defiance, rooted in patriotism, counters the left’s narrative of a fractured America. It’s a call to resilience that bureaucrats in Washington rarely muster.
Zito’s refusal to duck during the shooting gave her a clear view of the chaos, from Trump’s fall to the crowd’s panic. “I heard everything. Including his insistence to put his shoes on,” she wrote. Her steady nerve mirrors the heartland’s no-nonsense ethos, often dismissed by urban pundits.
Trump’s survival, he told Zito, wasn’t just luck but a divine act. “He concludes, several times, that it was the hand of God,” she recounted. Skeptics may scoff, but this belief galvanizes supporters who see Trump as a bulwark against a godless agenda.
The rally’s aftermath saw Trump double down on his mission, viewing the attack as a test of his resolve. Zito’s book captures this pivot, showing a leader who sees himself as more than a politician. Critics who paint him as reckless miss the deeper conviction driving his actions.
