Republican presidential candidate and former US President Donald Trump gestures with a bloodied face while he is assisted by US Secret Service personnel after he was shot in the right ear during a campaign rally at the Butler Farm Show in Butler, Pennsylvania, US, July 13, 2024.
Nearly two weeks after the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, there’s still no official report from the Trump campaign or from state or federal governments about what caused the wound on his right ear.
This lack of clarity has left the issue unsettled and fueled speculation online about whether he was hit by a bullet or shrapnel — or perhaps something else.
But a detailed analysis of bullet trajectories, footage, photos and audio by The New York Times strongly suggests Trump was grazed by the first of eight bullets fired by the shooter, Thomas Crooks. Subsequent bullets wounded two rally goers and killed a third.
What has helped stoke confusion is that Trump himself has said he was hit by a bullet, but his campaign has not released any official medical reports, nor has Trump’s current physician weighed in.
Instead, the campaign has posted a memo from Trump’s former White House physician, Ronny Jackson, now a Texas congressman and outspoken ally of the former president, that says he was struck by a bullet on his right ear.
The Secret Service, which was responsible for the security at the event, has declined to comment.
The FBI said it was examining numerous metal fragments found near the stage to determine whether a bullet — or pieces of it — had grazed Trump’s head, bloodying his ear.
A key piece of evidence in the Times’ analysis is a live video feed that captures Trump’s reaction as the first three gunshots are fired. The crack of the bullets are heard as they pass the microphone that Trump speaks into. Almost a second elapses between the first and second shots.
During this brief interim, Trump starts reaching toward his ear, according to footage and audio of the event analyzed by the Times and Rob Maher, an audio forensics expert at Montana State University.
“He flinches, and his right hand already starts reaching for his right ear during that time between the first audible shot and the second audible shot,” Maher said.
Trump’s fingers are bloodied as soon as he touches his ear, as seen in a picture taken by Doug Mills, a veteran Times photographer.
After clipping Trump, that first bullet appears to pass him and strike bleachers off to his left, where scores of his supporters are standing, the analysis suggests.
A puff of debris captured in a video snippet appeared to show the impact point of that shot — right beside a rally attendee, David Dutch.
“The puff visible at the back of the bleachers appears at the time of the first shot,” Maher said.
Dutch appears to have been injured by the second shot, which was fired along a similar trajectory. He winces as it rings out, and then crouches down as the third shot passes.
Another video indicates that the third bullet hit a crane near Dutch.
A 3-D model of the rally grounds produced by the Times shows the positions of the shooter and Trump, and the point where the first bullet hit the bleachers.
The model and the trajectory analysis show that the bullet traveled in a straight line from the shooter to the bleachers, clipping Trump on its path. This suggests the bullet was not deflected by first striking an object that would have then sprayed Trump with debris.
Crooks appears to have fired eight gunshots in total — a burst of three followed by a burst of five — before he was killed by Secret Service snipers. Investigators found eight shell casings around Crooks’ body on the warehouse roof, Col. Christopher Paris of the Pennsylvania State Police said in a congressional hearing Tuesday.
One bullet injured James Copenhaver, 74, in the abdomen. Copenhaver was standing just a few feet from Dutch.
A further video analysis shows that Corey Comperatore, 50, a father of two and volunteer firefighter, was shot in the head and killed most likely in the second volley of bullets fired by Crooks, a theory first posited on the social platform X by journalists Moshe Schwartz and Oliver Alexander.
A video shows Comperatore standing upright and apparently filming or taking photographs with his cellphone as the first three bullets are fired. When the second volley is fired, a baseball hat resembling that worn by Comperatore is seen flying through the air.
What appears to have put Comperatore in the line of fire is that the shooter may have been adjusting his aim lower as Secret Service agents protectively took Trump to the ground.
The security lapses that permitted Crooks to fire eight rounds unimpeded, at least three of which came close to seriously wounding Trump, have become the subject of an active congressional investigation. On Tuesday, the director of the Secret Service tendered her resignation.