In his first campaign appearance since the latest assassination attempt, former President Donald Trump suggested Tuesday that his presidency was so “serious” that it had been hit by multiple assassination attempts.
“You know, the only people who get shot are presidents who matter,” Trump declared at a town hall in Flint, Michigan, two days after the Secret Service thwarted the second assassination attempt in as many months.
“Running for president is a dangerous business,” the Republican candidate told Arkansas Gov. Sarah Sanders, who was hosting the event.
“Being president is a little bit dangerous,” Trump continued. “You know, they think driving race cars is dangerous, but it's not. They think bull riding is scary, right? No, it's a dangerous business and we've got to keep it safe.”
“God hasn't given up on President Trump yet,” said Sanders, a former White House press secretary.
“He is the toughest man I know and the warrior our country needs most right now,” she added.
Trump also said he had a “great conversation” with Biden and received a “very, very, great” call from Vice President Kamala Harris following the scary attack at Trump's West Palm Beach golf club on Sunday.
The suspect in the assassination attempt, Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was arrested and charged with federal gun crimes after he was accused of having an AK-47 rifle hidden in bushes adjacent to Trump's golf course.
“They're doing a great job,” Trump said of the Secret Service's response to the incident. “They definitely need more people. They've been complaining about it for a long time. But they've done a great job.”
“This guy was all prepared to take his turn,” the former president said of Routh, calling his preparation off the golf course “refined.”
Trump also praised the woman who chased Routh as he fled the scene and recorded his car's license plate number, allowing police to quickly track him down.
“Look, women are smarter than men,” Trump said of the wary woman, adding, “I want to meet her. I'm going to meet her.”
On policy, President Trump slammed moves by Chinese automakers to set up factories in Mexico to circumvent tariffs and import electric vehicles into the United States.
“There are factories in Mexico that are owned and built by the Chinese, and many more under construction,” he said of auto plants south of the border.
“They think they're going to build cars there and sell them in our country, and we're going to let them in and not tax them, we're going to tax them,” Trump asserted.
Here's what we know about the assassination attempt on President Trump in Florida.
“Now they're saying we're going to impose a 200% tariff, which means we can't sell it in the United States,” he continued.
“So you're wondering why I would get shot?” Trump quipped.
“When I say that, countries say, 'This guy,' but what can I do?” he argued. “You just have to do what you have to do, right? We have to be courageous, otherwise there will be no country left.”
President Trump is one of 15 U.S. presidents to have survived assassination attempts. Two others, Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy, were assassinated while in office after narrowly escaping previous attempts.
Former President Andrew Jackson was the victim of an assassination attempt at the U.S. Capitol in 1835. The madman's gun misfired..
Former presidents Gerald Ford and Franklin Roosevelt both attempted to hit would-be assassins at close range but apparently missed.
There were shootings at the White House during the presidencies of Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, and in 1994 a psychopath tried unsuccessfully to kill President Clinton by crashing a small plane onto the South Lawn.
We bring you the latest on the thwarted assassination attempt on Donald Trump in Florida.
Former presidents Ronald Reagan and Theodore Roosevelt (who, like Trump, were campaigning at the time) were shot but survived.
Former presidents Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Harry S. Truman and Herbert Hoover also had assassination attempts thwarted before they could be carried out.
Appearing on Fox News after the Flint rally, Trump said he “understands” the criticism directed at the Secret Service and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in the wake of the two assassination attempts, but said he was pleased with the Secret Service's work “in this case.”
“In this case, it worked out very well,” he said.
Asked whether agents should have searched the area around the golf course before his Sunday outing, Trump said, “It's hard to say.”
“I just said, 'Let's do a little round,'” he told Fox News host Sean Hannity. “To me, it's all business.”
“Golf is the only kind of exercise I get,” he said of his love of the game, arguing that presidents and presidential hopefuls “should be able to go out and do what they love, safely.”
“What happened with Butler is a whole other story,” Trump said of the first attempt on his life. “I'm sure there was somebody in that building, but that's a whole other story.”
Trump said his campaign had been “more aggressive than ever for a long time.” [Secret Service agents]” he said at the event, and believes that this will continue to be the case in the future.
“If there's a weakness, that's a weakness,” he said of the Secret Service's understaffing at his rallies.
“We've been asking for more personnel for a long time. I have to say at Butler we wanted more personnel. I've heard them say, 'We need more personnel for security,' but we never see that. But now we're on the verge of getting there,” Trump said. “Someone told me they're going to provide more personnel now.”
