Författare: Jack L. Rozdilsky Associate Professor of Disaster and Emerge

At a political rally in Pennsylvania, former president Donald Trump narrowly survived an assassination attempt. As gunshots rang out during the Republican candidate’s rally, Trump miraculously avoided a direct hit and said a bullet grazed his ear.

One person attending the rally was killed.

During the rapid sequence of events witnessed in the attack, Trump raised his right hand toward his head while his body moved towards the ground. Secret Service agents quickly rushed in, getting on top of Trump, forming a protective cone around him.

Members of the U.S. Secret Service surround Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump after shots were fired during his campaign event on July 13.
(AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)

After being down for about a minute, Trump rose and pumped his fist while his protective detail shielded him. The 78-year-old appeared to have been injured, with blood dripping from his ear. A 20-year-old man from Pennsylvania has been identified as the shooter. He was killed by Secret Service snipers who were watching over the rally.

This act of violence is an extremely disturbing turn of events in political affairs in the United States. However, it is not without precedent.

Read more:
Attempted assassination of Trump: The long history of violence against U.S. presidents

Reviewing event security

Of urgent importance, a U.S. Secret Service protective review will begin immediately to determine if there were any points of failure in the site security plan at the fairground at Butler, Pa. The results of that review will be immediately applied to current protection activities for all presidential candidates.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation will lead the investigation into the shooting. Agents from the FBI Pittsburgh Field Office will be joined by multidisciplinary teams, including the critical incident response group and evidence response technicians.

The FBI will need to answer big-picture questions quickly. Was the shooter a lone wolf? Did this assassination attempt result from politically motivated domestic terrorism?

Video footage of the immediate aftermath of the Trump shooting on July 13.

Security implications

Given this act of political violence has occurred immediately before the Republican National Convention (RNC) taking place in Milwaukee, there will be wide-ranging security implications for that gathering. It should be noted that the security preparation for the political convention was already at enhanced levels prior to the Trump assassination attempt.

In fact, a pre-emptive state of emergency had already been declared in May for the Milwaukee event.

The RNC has been designated a National Special Security Event. That designation allows for better co-ordination between multiple local, state and federal agencies to protect complex events from threats and to facilitate additional resource deployments to handle any type of civil emergency that may occur during the political gathering.

Historical precedents

Assassination attempts on candidates have happened during the 1968 and 1972 American presidential races. These incidents altered presidential election cycles of the past.

On June 5, 1968, Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was killed following a rally in California. Kennedy had just won the California primary and was fatally wounded by Sirhan Sirhan after giving a victory speech at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Sen. Robert F. Kennedy delivers remarks to a crowd in the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, on June 5, 1968, moments before his assassination.
(Sven Walnum, The Sven Walnum Photograph Collection/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston)

The dynamics of the 1968 presidential election were altered when the American voter’s choices of candidates were dictated in part by the outcome of political violence.

On May 5, 1972, George Wallace was campaigning to become the Democratic nominee for president. After a rally in Laurel, Md., Wallace was shot while shaking hands with attendees. He was a divisive politician who was an ardent segregationist and used tactics of stirring up fears for so-called forgotten white Americans. He survived the assassination attempt but was paralyzed for life.

After the shooting, Wallace reconsidered some of his controversial views.

Dark shadow of political violence

Have we entered an era of political upheaval in America where political violence will become the backdrop for U.S. politics?

Recent studies on attitudes toward political violence indicate that a small but not insignificant number of Americans support the idea of using violence to advance political ideas.

While Trump is the victim of this heinous attack, it’s difficult to ignore how he has catalyzed extreme political polarization. Trump has repeatedly acted to demonize his opponents and he tacitly supported political violence during the insurrection on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021.

Read more:
Pro-Trump rioters storm U.S. Capitol as his election tantrum leads to violence

Nonetheless, it’s unacceptable to consider that violence can be normalized as an expression of American political views. There is a clear and present danger that the outcome of political violence will be a determining factor for the outcome of the 2024 presidential election. Hopefully, the assassination attempt on Trump will not put undue influence on the American electorate. Läs mer…

A new chapter has been written regarding how protest encampments come to an end. The Ontario Superior Court of Justice granted an injunction to the University of Toronto on July 2, which provides a justification for police action. University officials gave protesters until 6 p.m. on Wednesday, July 3 to leave the site, and the encampment was dismantled before the deadline without any violence.

Protesters have been demanding that the university act in a way that supports a pro-Palestinian agenda with respect to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The demands include disclosing all investments, cutting ties with Israeli institutions and divesting from partnerships that “profit from the Palestinian suffering and deaths.”

As this latest chapter in the loud, symbolic public protest comes to an end at the University of Toronto, the bigger context is the emerging social phenomenon of protest camps.

Are protest camps legitimate venues for expression, or are they harmful to public order? By considering the larger issue of symbolic use of space and how these situations have ended, we can better consider public safety aspects of the current controversy.

A pro-Palestinian encampment on Columbia University’s campus in New York City on April 22, 2024.
(Shutterstock)

Protest encampments

Central to what happened at the University of Toronto, as well as other university campuses across Canada, was the issue of control of a specific space. A space was chosen to be occupied and used to draw attention to an issue that protesters deemed was otherwise difficult to receive attention for.

Protest camps are focal points for a movement, both organizationally and symbolically.

The taking over of a space to support a movement is not novel. In 2011, Occupy Wall Street took over Zuccotti Park in New York City. The privately owned public space turned out to be an effective location for setting up a protest encampment that attempted to highlight economic inequality, right in the city’s financial district itself.

Occupy Wall Street protesters’ tent city at Zuccotti Park in New York City’s financial district on Oct. 31, 2011.
(Shutterstock)

In the case of the Zuccotti Park encampment, the physical occupation lasted about 60 days before it was cleared. However, the rhetorical force of Occupy Wall Street depended on the persistent presence of a committed core of demonstrators, who worked to extend the impact of their message.

For whatever messages the encampment at the University of Toronto wants to express, the physical site of occupation has a finite lifespan. But a core group of protesters will try to extend the teachable moment of their presence as long as possible.

Ottawa occupied by the Freedom Convoy

In another example of a protest camp and its eviction, authorities took actions to end the so-called Freedom Convoy’s occupation of Ottawa in 2022.

Read more:
The occupation of Ottawa by the ’freedom convoy’ has the potential for an urban siege

There were orderly phases to the police action to evict Freedom Convoy activists. The first phase was stabilization, where reinforcements from other police forces were brought while a clear message was given to the protesters to disperse. Next, a slow and methodical line of officers swept in to clear an area, secure it and move on the next area.

An important part of the police action was that an escape route was left for protesters to depart voluntarily at the last minute. For those who did not leave, arrests were made to remove the dedicated core of intransigent protesters. In this phase, reasonable force was applied if the occupiers resisted. The cleared areas were then maintained so new agitators did not move in to refill the cleared encampment. After intransigent occupiers are lawfully removed, it is important to maintain the site for a period of time to prevent it from being reoccupied.

People keep warm around a fire across from Parliament Hill, as police work at a Freedom Convoy encampment further east along Rideau Street on Feb. 18, 2022.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang

The use of injunctions

The injunction to clear the University of Toronto protest is one part of a legal process that can lead to action resulting in an encampment coming to an end within the boundaries of the law. Any police action would be controversial, as inflammatory rhetoric would surround enforcement actions, but fear of controversy should not restrict necessary public safety actions.

At present, the Israel-Hamas war continues as the fate of 116 Israeli hostages remains unknown. Israel continues to cope with the deep impacts of the deadly Oct. 7 attacks, while Palestinians also cope with their own over 37,900 war-related casualties. A peaceful solution to the ongoing conflict remains elusive.

With emotions running high, it is hoped that cooler heads will prevail. Protesters removed all tents by the University of Toronto’s deadline, and dismantled the encampment. However, the larger struggles remain unaffected. This chapter of ending the occupation in Toronto will not act to materially stop the suffering in Israel and Palestine at this moment. Läs mer…