Trump addresses an assassination attempt in an interview for the first time
Elon Musk: A Crypto Influencer and an Angular Conversation with the Post on X, Y, and the Anti-Presidential Campaign
Shortly following reports of an apparent second assassination attempt against former US president and 2024 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, Elon Musk decided to speak up.
The interview, focused on his sons’ new cryptocurrency initiative and conducted by a crypto influencer, meandered to many of Trump’s typical campaign trail talking points.
He started by lauding the Secret Service, saying they did a “great job” Sunday in protecting him during the incident while he played golf at his course in West Palm Beach, Fla. He said he heard four to five gunshots and was whisked away in a golf cart.
Trump also recalled an assassination attempt against him in Butler, Pa., in June. One man died and two others were injured but there was no loss of life because of the attempt on Sunday.
“He couldn’t have been nicer,” said Trump. Trump criticized the policies of Biden and Vice President Harris as well as the policies of the rest of the administration, as was typical in his campaign appearances.
This comes after Biden and Harris were blamed for the apparent attempt on Trump’s life. In a post on X, he called Harris “hateful.”
On the attempted assassination of Trump and other democrats: JD Vance and Kamala Harris did not attend the Georgia Victory dinner
His running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, repeated that on the campaign trail Monday night at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Georgia Victory dinner in Atlanta.
The two people who tried to kill Donald Trump in the last couple of months were the first ones to try and assassinate Kamala Harris. That is a pretty strong example of how the left needs to tone down their rhetoric.
Musk is a major contractor for the US Department of Defense and NASA. According to Reuters, SpaceX signed a $1.8 billion contract in 2021 with the National Reconnaissance Office, which oversees US spy satellites. The US Space Force also signed a $70 million contract late last year with SpaceX to build out military-grade low-earth-orbit satellite capabilities. The US Navy is benefiting from the Starlink satellite internet wing.
Both Biden and Harris released statements about the attempted assassination of Trump. The White House condemned Musk’s post. “Violence should only be condemned, never encouraged or joked about,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is irresponsible.”
“In my experience, the Secret Service would take such a comment very seriously,” says Michael German, a former FBI special agent and a liberty and national security fellow at NYU School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice. “Typically, agents would go out and interview the subject to ensure that there wasn’t an existing threat, and to make the subject aware that the agency takes such statements seriously.”
The United States Secret Service declined WIRED’s request to comment on Musk’s post. The Secret Service looks at all threats related to their protectees, according to the USSS.
