Latest Trump shooting incident a reminder of past assassination attempts against US leaders

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Updated 16 September 2024
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Latest Trump shooting incident a reminder of past assassination attempts against US leaders

  • Four US presidents were assassinated while in office
  • Four presidents were wounded but survived assassination attempts, while in office or afterwards

WASHINGTON: The FBI is investigating what it said was another assassination attempt on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
The incident occurred Sunday at the Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach in Florida where Trump, the former president, was golfing.
Law enforcement officials said Secret Service saw a man with a rifle in the bushes and shot at the suspected assassin.
The suspect fled the bushes and was later apprehended on a highway, according to law enforcement.
Previous attempt on Trump
In July, Trump was shot by a gunman during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania in what the FBI said was an attempted assassination. The former president was wounded in the ear.
The Congressional Research Service says direct assaults against presidents, presidents-elect, and candidates have occurred on at least 15 separate occasions, with five resulting in death.
Below is a list of other previous attempts on the lives of American leaders, successful or not.

Assassinations
Four US presidents were assassinated while in office.
Abraham Lincoln: Killed in 1865 by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington.
James Garfield: Shot in 1881 in Washington at a train station and died of his wounds two and a half months later.
William McKinley: Assassinated in 1901 by an anarchist in Buffalo, New York.
John F. Kennedy: Assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in 1963 in Dallas, Texas, as the president rode in a motorcade.

Leaders who survived assassination attempts
Four presidents were wounded but survived assassination attempts, while in office or afterwards.
Donald Trump: Trump had just started a campaign speech in Pennsylvania on July 13 when shots rang out. Trump was shot in the ear. He was rushed by security officials to a black SUV.
Ronald Reagan: He was shot in 1981 outside the Hilton Hotel in Washington. Reagan was wounded when one of the bullets ricocheted off a limousine and struck him under the left armpit.

Gerald Ford: Survived two attempts on his life in less than three weeks in 1975 without being hurt.
Theodore Roosevelt: He was shot in the chest in 1912 while campaigning for election in Milwaukee, but insisted on delivering his speech to supporters before being taken to a hospital.
Assassination attempts on other US leaders
Robert F. Kennedy: A US presidential candidate, and a US senator, Kennedy was assassinated in 1968 by a gunman in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.
Alabama Governor George C. Wallace: A candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, he was shot in 1972 and became paralyzed from the waist down. (Reporting by Kanishka Singh and Mike Stone in Washington; Editing by Bernadette Baum, Lincoln Feast and Leslie Adler)


Venezuela parliament chief vows quick release of remaining political prisoners

Updated 9 sec ago
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Venezuela parliament chief vows quick release of remaining political prisoners

  • Venezuela's head of parliament promised the speedy release of remaining political prisoners

CARCAS: Venezuela’s head of parliament on Friday promised the speedy release of remaining political prisoners during a meeting with their relatives in which he promised to correct the government’s “mistakes.”
“By Friday (February 13) at the latest they will all be free,” Jorge Rodriguez, a former member of ousted leader Nicolas Maduro’s inner circle, told prisoners’ families outside the notorious Zona 7 detention center in Caracas.
“We are going to rectify all the mistakes that have been made.”
It was not clear whether he was referring to all remaining political prisoners — estimated to number around 700 by rights groups — or only those being held at Zona 7.
The meeting came a day after National Assembly members gave their initial backing to a draft amnesty covering the types of crimes used to lock up dissidents during 27 years of socialist rule.
But Venezuela’s largest opposition coalition denounced “serious omissions” in the amnesty measures Friday, after a shorter and more general draft of the law was released compared to the previous version circulated the day before.
The text “excludes large groups of civilian and military political prisoners,” “does not establish mechanisms for reparation to victims” and “does not guarantee the safe return of exiles,” the Democratic Unitary Platform coalition said in a statement.
Acting president Delcy Rodriguez is pushing the bill as a milestone on the path to reconciliation, a month after the US overthrow of Maduro.
Jorge Rodriguez, her brother, said the legislation would “repair all the mistakes” of Chavismo — the anti-US, socialist doctrine of late firebrand leader Hugo Chavez and his successor Maduro.
He said he expected parliament to complete the adoption of the bill as early as Tuesday.
“As soon as the law is adopted, they (prisoners) will also be released the same day,” he said.
Relatives surrounded the interim leader’s brother, clamoring for the release of their loved ones.
“Help me get my family member out of there, please,” a woman told him.
“We’re going to get them all out,” he replied while hugging another family member.
Nancy Plaza, whose husband is detained in Zona 7, said she told Rodriguez that “there are many mothers suffering” because of the detentions.
“I told him to please do it for my children, for me, for all the political prisoners,” she told AFP.
“We need him to be released. I’m going to believe that he will keep his promise.”