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Former US President Donald Trump said: “I should be dead” in his first interview since a gunman attempted to assassinate him on Saturday, July 13.
The former president called his narrow escape a “miracle” and revealed why moving his head at that moment saved his life.
Trump was shot in the ear at a political rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when Thomas Crooks, 20, opened fire from a nearby rooftop, spraying a hail of bullets into the crowd and toward the podium where Trump was standing, killing someone in the audience and seriously wounding two others.
Incredible footage from the scene shows the former president clutching his ear and falling to the ground as chaos erupts around him.
A team of secret service agents then quickly rescued him while snipers killed the assassin on the spot.
On Sunday night, blindfolded and flying on a private jet to the Republican convention in Milwaukee, Trump gave his first in-depth interview since the attempt on his life. He told the New York Post, “I should be dead.” I rarely take my eyes off the crowd.
If I hadn’t done it then, well, we wouldn’t be here talking today, would we?” Trump had turned his head to the right during his speech at the rally shortly after 6 p.m. Saturday, when bullets from the shooter’s AR-15 pistol came in just 130 yards away.
The bullet tore through his ear and tore off a small piece. An already iconic photograph shows him standing moments later, punching the air as blood flows down his face. Trump added: “The most incredible thing is that I not only turned, but I turned at exactly the right time and just the right amount.” The Republican frontrunner added: “Thankfully or by God, a lot of people say it’s because of God that I’m still here.
“Regarding the photos of him punching the air and saying ‘Fight, fight, fight!’ Trump said, ‘A lot of people say it’s the most iconic photo they’ve ever seen.’ They’re right, and I’m not dead. Usually you have to die to have an iconic photo.” The former president praised his Secret Service agents for acting like “linebackers,” tackling him to the ground so hard that he showed his interviewer a bruise on his arm.
As he was being dragged to safety in a car at the rally, the former president could be heard saying, “Wait, I want to get my shoes.” He revealed in the interview that the force of his security grabbing him to the ground had torn them off. “The officers hit me so hard my shoes fell off, and my shoes are tight,” Trump told the outlet with a smile. He added, “The doctor at the hospital said he’d never seen anything like it, called it a miracle.
“They did a fantastic job…” “It’s surreal for all of us.” Trump also revealed that he scrapped a speech he planned to give at the Republican National Convention on Thursday. “I had a speech prepared that was extremely tough, really good, all about the corrupt, horrible administration,” “But I threw it away,” he told the Post. Trump said he was reworking his remarks “to try to unite the country,” but said, “I don’t know if that’s possible. People are very divided.”
