A nationally known presidential historian, Rice University's Douglas Brinkley plays a key role in analyzing major news events involving current and former presidents. Following the July 13 assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, Brinkley provided historical insight and context to several major news organizations and publications.
Appearing live on Fox News, Brinkley, the Katherine Tsanoff Brown Humanities Professor of History, was asked how the assassination attempt on President Trump would affect his legacy.
“This is a seminal moment in his biography,” Brinkley said. “He gets hit in the head, he's bleeding, he has his arms up, he's telling people, 'keep fighting,' 'keep fighting.' It's like a boxing movie. What's shown on screen is a certain fortitude, a certain will.”
In a Washington Post article, Brinkley said Trump's appearance immediately after the shooting would be symbolic. “There's something about the American psyche that loves to display fortitude and courage under pressure, and the fact that Trump had his fist raised would be another symbol,” Brinkley said in the article. “Surviving an assassination attempt makes you a martyr, because it brings you public sympathy.”
“This is a huge boost to his presidential campaign in a depressing and surreal way,” Brinkley told The New York Times in an interview.
During a live interview with Norah O'Donnell on the CBS Evening News, the host noted that the FBI has seen an uptick in violent political rhetoric since the assassination attempt, and Brinkley was asked what that says about the state of American politics.
“It's sad,” he responded. “There's no room for this kind of hate speech. It incites political violence. Let's hope that people will tone it down and that Joe Biden and Trump will both call on people to turn down the temperature. We're fighting a tough election, but we're not fighting to end a kind of anarchy across the country.”
In the early hours of the morning after the attack, Brinkley spoke to CBS 24/7 via live telephone interview about the history of political violence. Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley and John F. Kennedy are the only U.S. presidents to have been assassinated. President Trump joins Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan on this list as presidents who have been wounded in assassination attempts.
“It changes a person fundamentally,” Brinkley said. “President Reagan wrote in his diary that when he woke up from the surgery and looked at the ceiling, he said he was going to dedicate his life to God. For President Reagan, it was a profound religious experience.”
Looking ahead to the country, Brinkley was blunt, saying, “We must come together as a country to counter political violence.”
Trump is set to accept the Republican presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this week, and Brinkley indicated he'd like to keep an eye on the tone and tone. “The whole point of a convention is to have fun,” Brinkley said in a live interview on MSNBC on July 15, alluding to President Lyndon Johnson's use of humor to lighten the mood at the 1964 Republican National Convention, less than a year after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. “At a convention like this, we need Mr. Trump to lighten the mood with humor.”
