THE NEW YORK TIMES: Donald Trump details assassination attempt in Republican Party Convention speech

MILWAUKEE — Five days after a gunman tried to assassinate him at a political rally, former President Donald Trump on Thursday night described his personal experience of the shooting as he formally accepted the Republican Party’s presidential nomination and called on Americans to see in him a unifier.

“As you already know, the assassin’s bullet came within a quarter of an inch of taking my life,” Trump said at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

“So many people have asked me what happened — ‘Tell us what happened, please.’ And therefore, I’ll tell you exactly what happened, and you’ll never hear it from me a second time, because it’s actually too painful to tell.”

The crowd inside Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee was rapt and silent as Trump described turning his head to look at a chart on a screen behind him and then feeling a bullet hit his ear.

“Behind me and to the right was a large screen that was displaying a chart of border crossings under my leadership,” he said. “In order to see the chart, I started to turn to my right, and was ready to begin a further turn, which I’m lucky I didn’t, when I heard a loud whizzing sound and felt something hit me, really hard, on my right ear.

“I said to myself, ’Wow, what was that — it can only be a bullet — and moved my right hand to my ear, brought it down, and my hand was covered with blood,” Trump said.

“I immediately knew it was very serious, that we were under attack, and in one movement, proceeded to drop to the ground.”

He was lucky, he said, he had not turned further.

“The amazing thing is that prior to the shot, if I had not moved my head at the very last instant, the assassin’s bullet would have perfectly hit its mark,” Trump said.

“I’m not supposed to be here tonight,” he said.

The crowd, devoted fans of a man they had nominated to be their presidential candidate, responded in unison by chanting, “Yes, you are.”

Trump shook his head. “I’m not,” he said, adding that it was only “by the grace of almighty God” that he had survived.

He added the “most incredible aspect” of the attack was how the crowd responded.

“Many of them bravely, but automatically, stood up looking for where the sniper would be, and then began pointing at him,” Trump said.

“Nobody ran, and by not stampeding, many lives were saved,” he said. “But that isn’t the reason they didn’t move — the reason is that they knew I was in serious trouble, they saw all of the blood, and thought I was dead, and they just didn’t want to leave me, and you can see that love written all over their faces.

“When I rose, surrounded by Secret Service, the crowd was confused because they thought I was dead, and there was great sorrow on their faces until I raised my right arm, looked at the thousands of people that were breathlessly waiting, and started shouting ’fight, fight, fight!”

On the stage with him was the jacket and helmet of Corey Comperatore, a volunteer firefighter and supporter who was killed in the shooting. Leaving the podium briefly, Trump kissed the helmet.

The former president’s recounting of the shooting, in his first public speech since the assassination attempt, came as he encouraged Americans to unify behind him.

Trump — who frequently mocks his political enemies, has promised retribution against them and often insists this election is the country’s “final battle” — insisted that Americans must put aside the divisions that he has often stoked.

“The discord and division in our society must be healed. We must do it quickly,” Trump said. “As Americans, we are bound together by a single fate and a shared destiny. We rise together. Or we fall apart.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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