How Trump's Near-Assassination Was Downplayed and Memory-Holed in the Media

Newsweek

12-07-2025

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A year after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, some political commentators are arguing the incident was minimized by the media, while marveling at how quickly the near-murder of the former and future American president has faded from public consciousness.
On the eve of the 2024 Republican National Convention, a gunman opened fire on Trump from a rooftop near the Butler fairgrounds, grazing Trump's ear, killing a local firefighter, Corey Comperatore, and injuring two others. While the attack could have been a galvanizing national moment, some media critics say it was instead overshadowed by election coverage, partisan concerns, and editorial decisions meant to avoid amplifying Trump's near-death experience.
This week, Veteran political journalist Mark Halperin, on his Next Up podcast, called the muted response "one of the best ways to understand what we're still going through as a country."
In a conversation with Journalist Salena Zito, ahead of the release of her book 'Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Heartland,' Halperin highlighted what he saw as a stark disconnect between how the media treated Trump's shooting and how it might have covered similar attacks on Democratic leaders.
This aerial photo of the Butler Farm Show, site of the Saturday, July 13, 2024 Trump campaign rally, shown Monday, July 15, 2024 in Butler, Pa.
This aerial photo of the Butler Farm Show, site of the Saturday, July 13, 2024 Trump campaign rally, shown Monday, July 15, 2024 in Butler, Pa.
AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar
"The left, the people who do not like Donald Trump, did not treat his attempted assassination the way they would have if it had been Barack Obama or Joe Biden," Halperin said, describing what he saw as an "extraordinary failure" to confront the shooter's motive or scrutinize the security breakdown.
Footage and investigations have since raised more questions about how the would-be assassin, Thomas Crooks, was able to position himself with a clear line of sight toward the presumptive Republican candidate for president. But as a cascade of security failures have come to light, public attention has waned.
Conservative commentator Drew Holden wrote in The Spectator that the effort to downplay the shooting "started moments after the shots rang out," with networks using vague language like "loud noises" and "popping sounds" to describe the scene — even after the Associated Press confirmed Trump had indeed been hit by live fire.
Holden noted that within weeks, coverage in major outlets dropped off dramatically, comparing it unfavorably to the media's treatment of the January 6 Capitol riot.
"Just a couple of months before the 2024 election, I think the press was afraid of adding fuel to the Trump campaign, especially since some polling at the time showed the assassination attempt had boosted his popularity," Holden told Newsweek about his findings.
'Abandoned Coverage'
Halperin and Holden have both sharply criticized the way media outlets covered — and then quickly abandoned — the story of Trump's near-assassination, framing it as a revealing moment about U.S. politics and journalism.
On his podcast, Halperin argued that the muted response reflected deep-seated hostility to Trump from mainstream institutions, which failed to interrogate the story the way they would have if the target were a Democrat. He cited examples of commentators and anchors — including Martha Raddatz of ABC News and Margaret Brennan of CBS News — who quickly pivoted to blaming Trump's own rhetoric rather than focusing on the attack itself.
'Can you imagine that? Someone tries to kill the president, former president, front runner, and between the government and the media, it is an absolute mystery…'@markhalperin reflects back on how the media and the Left blamed TRUMP for Butler assassination attempt – and… pic.twitter.com/Ky9uvJClpi — Next Up with Mark Halperin (@NextUpHalperin) July 8, 2025
"You see in the immediate aftermath of the near-death of Donald Trump, people wanting to hold him accountable for his own near murder. It's kind of incredible," Halperin said.
He also criticized commentators who cast doubt on the seriousness of Trump's injuries, including MSNBC's Michael Steele, the former Republican operative turned fierce Trump critic who speculated on-air whether the ear wound was caused by glass instead of a bullet.
JUST IN - YOUR REACTION: Former RNC Chair Michael Steele Demands Answers, Says, 'If Trump Was Shot with a High-Caliber Bullet, There Should Be Very Little Ear There,' Asks, 'Where is the Medical Report from the Hospital or Campaign?' Suggests a Cover-Up. WATCH pic.twitter.com/n6yjMXPa90 — Simon Ateba (@simonateba) July 17, 2024
"Even a week after he'd been shot and the doctors had spoken out, you heard all this skepticism from the left," Halperin noted.
Holden highlighted the media's coverage of the shooting in a detailed X thread, posting screenshots of early headlines from USA Today, NBC News, CNN and the Los Angeles Times that downplayed the attack as "popping noises" or an "incident."
He also pointed out that some in the media, including Joy Reid, formerly of MSNBC, and Raddatz of ABC, blamed Trump's own rhetoric for the shooting, even in the hours immediately afterward. It was a trend that, as Holden noted, continued even after the second attempt on Trump's life was thwarted last September.
Joy Reid of MSNBC is now suggesting that Donald Trump was never hit by a bullet, and that his campaign and the Secret Service colluded to kill two people in a fake assassination attempt just so Trump could have a photo op.
Outrageous. Insane. Defamatory.
NBC must take Reid off… pic.twitter.com/OLXz08fbE9 — Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) July 18, 2024
ABC's Martha Raddatz's seething hate is all apparent in her haggard face.
Here she is blaming Trump for the assassination attempt on his life using the 'bloodbath' hoax.
pic.twitter.com/HfItBcZcCT — John Ocasio-Rodham Nolte (@NolteNC) July 14, 2024
NBC's Lester Holt: "Today's apparent assassination attempt comes amid increasingly fierce rhetoric on the campaign trail. Mr. Trump, his running mate JD Vance continue to make baseless claims about Haitian immigrants" in Springfield, Ohio, resulting in bomb threats. pic.twitter.com/apw9WQ1liR — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) September 15, 2024
On X, Holden highlighted coverage from networks like CBS, which questioned whether Trump "really needed all that bandaging on his ear" when he spoke days later at the Republican National Convention to formally accept the party's nomination.
Trump didn't require stitches on his ear because it was a scratch, not a gaping bullet wound.
So the wad of gauze was slapped on his ear for dramatic effect, as suspected. pic.twitter.com/17eKxvfFEG — Christopher Webb (@cwebbonline) July 20, 2024
Coverage in the print press also quickly dwindled, despite a flood of questions about Crooks' motives and background and the security failures on behalf of Secret Service and local law enforcement. Holden pointed to New Yorker columnist Jay Caspian Kang, who observed that just three days after the shooting "there were no stories about the shooting in the top slots on the websites of the New York Times, the Washington Post, or the Wall Street Journal."
By late August, he said, the coverage had all but ceased.
"The shooting happened less than a month after Biden stepped aside as the nominee following his disastrous debate performance. The last thing the press wanted was to make that worse," Holden told Newsweek.
The Butler assassination attempt came in the midst of a summer that many commentators across the political spectrum have acknowledged as the wildest few weeks in modern American politics. In the days that followed, Trump picked his running mate, JD Vance, while President Joe Biden — already reeling from the fallout from his debate performance weeks earlier — announced he was stepping aside as the Democratic nominee and endorsed his running mate to lead the ticket.
Trump would be reelected 15 weeks later.