European leaders wished presidential candidate Donald Trump well and expressed concern about the emergency of political violence in democracies following the new assassination attempt, but many European capitals appeared to condone the attacks.
Former US President Donald Trump, who is running for re-election in November, was apparently targeted again by a gunman at his golf course in West Palm Beach on Sunday. Authorities are treating the shooting as an “assassination attempt” and a suspect is in police custody.
While several European leaders have spoken out expressing sympathy for President Trump, at the time of writing many capitals have remained virtually silent, with no meaningful statement being issued more than 18 hours after the attacks.
Top European leaders who have so far not commented on the former US president's assassination allegations include French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Several British politicians, including former prime minister and Trump ally Nigel Farage, spoke out, and the new left-wing Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, currently visiting Italy, told a television station he was “deeply worried” about the assassination attempt and stressed his concern about violence. “To be clear, violence has absolutely no place in any political debate,” he said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was one of the first European leaders to speak out about the attack on Monday morning, expressing joy that Trump was unharmed but also speaking of the need to separate violence from politics. He said: “It's good that the suspect in the assassination attempt was quickly arrested. This is our principle. The rule of law comes first and foremost, and political violence has no place anywhere in the world.”
Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a veteran European right-wing populist and longtime supporter of President Trump, was quick to warn on Monday that Trump's life would remain at risk “until he wins,” at which point he may have been able to more effectively command the Secret Service. Orbán, one of the few political leaders in Europe who has not abandoned his words of faith, followed up with, “Mr. President, we are praying for you!”
Further afield, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed shock at the attempted attack and relief that it failed, but warned political leaders not to “trust luck” to prevent the worst. He continued, “I send my heartfelt congratulations to Donald and Melania, and I hope that all measures will be taken to prevent such a deadly attack against a US presidential candidate.”
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also said it was good news that Trump was not a victim, and joined others in defending the democratic process: “We all want our democratic process to be peaceful and orderly. This incident in the United States raises renewed concerns,” he said.
Russia also responded to the Trump shooting, but seemed more interested in scoring points and stirring up trouble than offering sympathy: Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov insisted that “this is not our knowledge,” but Putin's close aide Dmitry Medvedev went all in, speculating, without providing any evidence, that the assassin was actually an agent of the Ukrainian government.
