Donald Trump walked the Republican National Convention on Monday behind a tranche of impressive bodyguards, just days after he survived an attempt on his life in Pennsylvania.
The GOP candidate waved to the Milwaukee crowd, pumped his fist and was met with thunderous applause. Trump showed off his bandaged ear, which he had been wearing when he was hit by an assassin’s bullet on Saturday.
Trump is not expected to speak at the convention until Thursday, but traveled to Wisconsin on Sunday, 24 hours after the attempted assassination.
Trump, who is 6 feet 3 inches tall, was surrounded by a dozen or so equally muscular bodyguards as he made his entrance. There was much criticism from conservative figures at X over the ex-president’s security.
On Monday, Trump announced that Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, who once compared the nominee to Adolf Hitler, would be his running mate in the November election.
Trump triumphantly walks into the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee on Monday
Video footage showed the 6-foot-3 president surrounded by equally muscular security guards
On Saturday afternoon, Crooks was able to sneak onto a rooftop location about 500 feet from the stage where Trump was speaking in Butler, Pennsylvania, and began firing an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle purchased by his father, officials said.
The Secret Service, responsible for protecting presidents and former presidents, went on the defensive Monday after it emerged it had failed to spot the shooter.
“Secret Service personnel on the ground responded quickly to the incident. Our anti-sniper team neutralized the shooter and our agents took protective measures to ensure the safety of former President Donald Trump,” Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle said in a statement.
Biden ordered an independent investigation into how the gunman, who was shot dead by officers moments after he opened fire, came so close to killing or seriously injuring Trump despite heavy agency security.
The president has also directed the Secret Service to set up a security detail for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
On Monday, Trump announced that Senator JD Vance of Ohio would be his running mate
Thomas Matthew Crooks, the 20-year-old would-be assassin who shot Donald Trump, was once rejected by his high school’s shooting club and was considered dangerous
Kennedy has no chance of winning the Electoral College votes, let alone the presidency. But his campaign events have drawn large crowds of supporters and people interested in his message.
His campaign team has been urging the president for months to grant him Secret Service protection, making multiple requests after several incidents.
In October, a man was arrested after twice entering Kennedy’s Los Angeles home in one day. A month earlier, an armed man accused of impersonating a federal agent was captured outside a Kennedy campaign rally.
The FBI has taken the lead in the investigation into the shooting.
Trump flew to Milwaukee on Sunday, 24 days after the assassination attempt.
Trump pumped his fist in the air several times and appeared to mutter the words “Fight! Fight! Fight!” as he walked down the steps of his plane.
In an interview during the trip, he said the realization that he had been so close to death was sobering.
“That reality is just now sinking in,” Trump said, according to the Washington Examiner. “I rarely look away from the crowd. If I hadn’t done that at that moment, well, we wouldn’t be having this today, right?”
“I want to try to unite our country,” the New York Post reported Trump as saying during the flight. “But I don’t know if that’s possible. People are very divided.
