Long list of presidents have been shot or shot at

By Zachary B. Wolf, CNN

(CNN) — Former President Donald Trump fell to the ground Saturday, clutching his face after what sounded like gunfire at a rally in Pennsylvania.

Blood could be seen on his face as he was carried away by Secret Service.

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Multiple presidents and former presidents and candidates for president have been attacked in US history, according to a CNN report from 2011 and a list of instances of political violence that includes attacks on senators, congressmen and governors compiled by CNN’s research library.

Multiple presidents, former presidents or candidates have survived assassination attempts

In the pre-Civil War era, President Andrew Jackson was shot at while attending a funeral in the Capitol. The shooter fired twice, but the gun failed.

Former President Theodore Roosevelt, like Trump, was trying to get his old job back during the 1912 campaign. He was shot on the way to a speech in Milwaukee by a saloon keeper. Roosevelt later said a folded-up copy of his 50-page speech slowed the bullet, which stayed in his body for the rest of his life. He gave the speech despite the shooting.

Franklin D. Roosevelt was president-elect when a would-be assassin fired at him in Miami in 1933. The shooter, Guiseppe Zangara, missed Roosevelt but killed Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak. He was put to death by electrocution.

Harry Truman, who took over the presidency after Roosevelt died, was shot at across from the White House by Puerto Rican nationalists in 1950.

Alabama Gov. George Wallace, a segregationist who was running for president for the third time in 1972, was shot after a campaign event outside Washington, DC. The shooting left him paralyzed from the waist down, and he later rethought his politics.

Gerald Ford faced two assassination attempts in quick succession in 1975. Lynette “Sqeaky” Fromme, a follower of cult leader Charles Manson, was foiled before she could fire at Ford in Sacramento, California. Weeks later, a woman named Sara Jane Moore shot at Ford in San Francisco but missed because a bystander grabbed her.

Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981 outside the Hilton in Washington, DC, after giving a speech. His press secretary, James Brady, was more seriously wounded than Reagan and later became an activist for gun control. Reagan’s shooter, John Hinckley, spent decades in a mental institution. He was released from court supervision in 2022.

All presidents face threats and all former presidents also get lifetime Secret Service protection.

An Idaho man was charged with the attempted assassination of Barack Obama when he fired shots at the White House in 2011. A man was charged with trying to assassinate then-President Bill Clinton in 1994 after shooting at the White House, and a plot to assassinate former President George H.W. Bush in Kuwait was foiled in 1993, after he left office. His son, then-President George W. Bush, faced a failed assassination attempt by a man with a grenade while visiting the country Georgia in 2005.

Four US presidents who were assassinated were all shot

Abraham Lincoln was the first president to die by assassination. He was shot in the back of the head in 1865 during an appearance at Ford’s Theater in Washington, DC, by John Wilkes Booth, an actor in the play that night and Southern sympathizer. Booth fled the scene and was shot when he was captured weeks later in Virginia.

James Garfield was shot at a train station in Washington, DC, in July 1881. He died from his wounds months later, in September, in New Jersey. Garfield was shot by Charles Guiteau, a disaffected former supporter with mental illness who was angry at not getting a job in Garfield’s administration. Guiteau was convicted and hanged within the year.

William McKinley was shot in September 1901 in Buffalo, New York, by Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist. McKinley was making an appearance at the Pan-American Exposition. He lingered for days in Buffalo before dying from his wounds. Czolgosz was later electrocuted.

John F. Kennedy was killed by a sniper, Lee Harvey Oswald, in Dallas in November 1963 as he was driven down a parade route in an open-topped limousine. Oswald, a Soviet sympathizer, was arrested shortly after the assassination. Oswald was himself killed by Jack Ruby in the basement of the Dallas police station.

JFK’s brother, Robert F. Kennedy, was a senator from New York when he was running for president in 1968. RFK was shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles the night he won the California Democratic primary. His killer, Sirhan Sirhan, is still in jail in California and recently had a parole request denied. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is an independent candidate for president this year.

Clarification: This story has been updated to clarify the timeline of Oswald’s arrest.

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