Was the Donald Trump assassination attempt of July 2024 staged?

[countablenewt@mastodon.social]

@evan no, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I were wrong

[malte@radikal.social]

@evan No, but his people made good use of it and I wouldn't be surprised if they even had a contingency plan for what to do if something like that would happen.

[spraoi@tooting.ch]

@evan yes, but not very well.

[jeremy@nwt.social]

@evan this result is so interesting to me. I would have thought only a handful of people would have believed it to be staged given how commonplace assassinations and attempted assassinations are in US history. Also, it would be just so difficult to fake something like this and keep the truth from coming out incredibly quickly.

[terryhancock@realsocial.life]

@evan
NB

The problem I have with this theory is that there WAS a shooter and one of the people on the stage was killed by that bullet.

Was THAT faked?

To do that without risking really killing Trump would have required an expert marksman and a great deal of trust.

I doubt that kid met either description.

But if he did, then after being recruited for this highly trusted role, he is then murdered. That's hard to swallow (not for moral reasons, but because it requires an odd mix of skill and gullibility -- more risk factors).

Or was THAT faked?

What exactly is being proposed here..?

No, I get the ear thing seems faked or exaggerated. But Trump would hardly be carrying around stage blood unless he was prepared for this, and that would mean he was complicit. Would that cowardly narcissist actually agree to a plan with this level of risk to his person? Seems doubtful.

But if I heard a proposed theory that actually fit the facts...or else some of my facts are wrong... then I might consider it.

They certainly took advantage of it quickly. Which is the main source of suspicion. But then maybe they're just fast on their feet with spin..?

[terryhancock@realsocial.life]

@evan

Now, maybe there's an extremely clever way to pull off this legerdesmains (I am no magician, to be sure), but that leaves us with another problem:

How do these Machiavellian masters of deception then go on to become the absolutely ham-fisted bumbling fools we then seen in the Trump administration?

Where these geniuses outsmarted and assassinated by the fools? Did they go back to Russia, maybe..? To leave the puppet government they set up to flap in the wind, ultimately failing Putin's objectives on multiple occasions..?

It requires people to be simultaneously masters of the "5D chess" AND bumbling morons at once.

It's just very hard for me to square that.

I mean, I totally would not put such a plot past these people morally. I just don't believe they COULD do it. I think a plan they came up with would look different.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

This is such an interesting topic.

There was an article in The New Republic recently on the subject:

MAGA Increasingly Believes Trump Assassination Attempt Was Fake | Flipboard

newrepublic.com - President Trump’s base seems to be turning against him like never before. As Donald Trump’s MAGA base sours on him, some of them now think the 2024 …

Flipboard (flipboard.com)

[evan@cosocial.ca]

I will say that if the Trump campaign faked an assassination attempt which resulted in 2 deaths and a half dozen injuries for political gain, it would definitely be in the top 50 worst things Trump has done; maybe even top 20. But I don't think it's unfair to even bring up the question.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

I have not been involved in faking an assassination attempt, but it seems very hard to do well. If one of my staff suggested recruiting a depressed young man to try to murder me, and miss by just a little bit, I would probably ask to go around the room one more time for safer campaign ideas.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

I think it's more likely, at least logically, that some other entity tried to organize an assassination, tried to make it look like a lone gunman scenario, and it failed. Goldfish Fanciers, Gnomes of Zurich, SMOF, some other group makes more sense than the people on the same stage with Trump, with guns pointed in their own direction.

[bananarama@mstdn.social]

@evan I don't understand how or why it would be staged. They're not sufficiently competent to cover that up, and guns are incredibly easy to access in the US.

[halcy@icosahedron.website]

@evan well, of course you‘d have him shooting blanks while some other well hidden guy nearby does the actual shooting (and for the shot at you, you just have some fake blood rigged).

It does seem like an incredibly high risk (if anyone screws up even a bit or points a camera the wrong way it’s over) low reward (minuscule polling bump) play, regardless of

[evan@cosocial.ca]

I think it's also fair to say that there are some very dumb and very evil people in Trump's orbit. Maybe somebody thought it was a good idea, took the initiative, and didn't circulate a group memo? Again, I would not put it past them.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

Regardless, I find it hard to say that this event was "staged" in any meaningful way. I'm a No, But.