After rally shooting, Trump arrives in Milwaukee ahead of Republican National Convention
CBC
Former U.S. president Donald Trump arrived in Milwaukee on Sunday for the Republican National Convention, a day after he was injured at a campaign rally in what the FBI is investigating as an attempted assassination.
Trump had said earlier Sunday that he was going to delay his trip because of the shooting but then decided he didn't want it to force a change in his schedule.
Trump is not expected to speak at the convention, where the party will formally make him their presidential nominee, until Thursday night.
President Joe Biden, a Democrat, said he had ordered a review of how a 20-year-old man carrying an AR-15-style rifle managed on Saturday to get close enough to shoot from a rooftop at Trump, who as a former president has lifetime protection by the U.S. Secret Service.
Trump, 78, was holding a campaign rally in Butler, Pa. — one of the states expected to be the most competitive in the Nov. 5 election — when shots rang out, hitting his right ear and streaking his face with blood. His campaign said he was doing well and appeared to have suffered no major injury besides a wound on his upper right ear.
Trump is due to receive his party's formal nomination at the convention, which kicks off in Milwaukee on Monday.
Michael Whatley, who chairs the Republican National Committee, said on Fox News Sunday that authorities are working together to safeguard the venue, where officials have spent months making security preparations.
"I was going to delay my trip to Wisconsin, and The Republican National Convention, by two days, but have just decided that I cannot allow a 'shooter,' or potential assassin, to force change to scheduling, or anything else. Therefore, I will be leaving for Milwaukee, as scheduled," Trump wrote on his Truth Social site on Sunday.
On Sunday evening, Biden said in televised remarks from the Oval Office that the United States "must not go down" the road of political violence.
"It's time to cool it down," the U.S. president said of the rhetoric surrounding American politics. "We must never descend into violence.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke to Trump on Sunday, according to his office. Trudeau "condemned yesterday's appalling assassination attempt," the PMO said, adding he "wished the former president well and offered condolences to the shooting victims."
The FBI identified Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pa., as the suspect in what it called an attempted assassination. He was a registered Republican, according to state voter records, and had made a $15 donation to a Democratic political action committee at the age of 17.
Law enforcement officials told reporters they had yet to identify a motive for the attack. Both Republicans and Democrats will be looking for evidence of Crooks's political affiliation as they seek to cast the rival party as representing extremism.
"There is no place in America for this kind of violence," Biden said at the White House. "I urge everyone, everyone please don't make assumptions about his motive or affiliations."
Ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad says he had no plans to leave the country after the fall of Damascus a week ago but the Russian military evacuated him after their base in western Syria came under attack.
The death toll in the French territory of Mayotte from Cyclone Chido is "several hundred" and may run into the thousands, the island's top government official told a local broadcaster on Sunday.
In the days since Luigi Mangione was charged with killing the top executive at one of the largest health insurers in America, an untold number of people online have declared him a modern-day hero.
Syrians seeking to chart their own political course, free from outside interference, following the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad may be thwarted by the geopolitical ambitions of their neighbours, who already have a foothold in the country, experts say.
It's hard to envision anyone celebrating the shooting death of a doctor. Or, for that matter, a hospital administrator, a pharma employee, an average U.S. politician or voter.
Every night for half of her life, Ghena Ali Mostafa has spent the moments before sleep envisioning what she'd do first if she ever had the chance to step back into the Syrian home she fled as a girl. She imagined herself laying down and pressing her lips to the ground, and melting into a hug from the grandmother she left behind. She thought about her father, who disappeared when she was 13.
The suspect in the killing of UnitedHealthcare's CEO struggled with deputies and shouted Tuesday while arriving for a court appearance in Pennsylvania, a day after he was arrested at a McDonald's and charged with murder.
Syria's new interim leader announced on Tuesday he was taking charge of the country as caretaker prime minister with the backing of the former rebels who toppled President Bashar al-Assad three days ago.
The three-starred flag representing Syrian rebel groups was hoisted up a pole atop the Syrian embassy in Moscow on Monday — even as Bashar Al-Assad, Syria's brutal dictator, is believed to be in exile in Russia after President Vladimir Putin granted him and his family asylum.
Among the many moments of celebration across Syria on Sunday, the scene at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus may be remembered as one of the most significant.
