(NewsNation) — The shooting at a rally for former President Donald Trump is the first time in decades that shots have been fired at a president or candidate, something that is “rare” in American politics today, according to NewsNation’s Washington D.C. Bureau Chief Mike Viqueira.
“This is extremely rare in modern American politics since that time. I’m racking my brain trying to think of other incidents like this and I cannot,” Viqueira said.
President Ronald Reagan came very close to dying after he was shot in Washington on March 30, 1981, just two months into his presidency. Reagan, having just finished a speech at the Washington Hilton, was waving to the crowd when the shots were fired from the area where reporters were standing.
“Heroic actions then by the Secret Service, thinking fast, and it’s always amazing to see the Secret Service work under these conditions,” Viqueira said.
Reagan was hit by a bullet that ricocheted off the presidential limousine, hitting him under the arm. The fragment broke a rib, punctured a lung and caused serious internal bleeding. Reagan left the hospital 12 days later.
Three others were wounded in the pistol attack, including a Secret Service agent and a Washington, D.C. police officer. White House press secretary James Brady was shot in the head suffering a serious brain injury and was permanently disabled. When Brady died in 2014, his death was classified as a homicide.
The shooter, John Hinkley, Jr. acted not because of politics but over his obsession with actress Jodie Foster. Hinkley was found not guilty by reason of insanity and spent 35 years in a psychiatric hospital in Washington.
Gerald Ford and two assassination attempts
President Gerald Ford was the target of two assassination attempts within three weeks. Both occurred in Northern California, and both suspects were women.
On September 5, 1975, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme was standing about an arm’s length away from Ford on the grounds of the California State Capitol building in Sacramento when she raised a pistol and pulled the trigger.
While there were four rounds in the 54-year-old Army surplus Colt .45, but Fromme had not put a round in the chamber. She was wrestled to the ground almost immediately after raising the weapon.
“I saw a hand coming up behind several others in the front row. And obviously there was a gun in that hand,” Ford said afterward.
Fromme, a member of the Charles Manson “family,” was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. She was released in 2009.
On September 22, 1975, Ford was back in California, speaking to the World Affairs Council in San Francisco. As Ford was walking from the St. Francis Hotel to his limousine, he turned and waved to the crowd. Moore, about 40 feet away, fired two shots.
The first missed Ford’s head by a few inches. The second struck a taxi driver standing outside the hotel. He survived. A bystander, hearing the first shot, tackled Moore as she fired the second shot. Police quickly subdued Moore as Secret Service agents pushed Ford into his limousine and raced to San Francisco International Airport.
Moore was convicted and sentenced to life in prison He told an interviewer she wanted to spark a violent revolution to bring about change in the U.S. She was paroled in 2007.
Both Fromme and Moore are alive today.
Four presidents who died
President John F. Kennedy became the 4th president to die by assassination on November 22, 1963 in Dallas. A government commission officially concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, but 60 years later the furor over Kennedy’s death and Oswald’s role remains intense.
President William McKinley was shot on September 6, 1901, in Buffalo, N.Y. He died eight days later. James Garfield was shot on July 2, 1881, and didn’t die until eleven weeks later.
President Abraham Lincoln, the first president to be assassinated, was shot on April 14, 1865, in Washington D.C. He died the next morning.
Failed and foiled attempts
There have been many other plots and failed assassination attempts on U.S. presidents. Among the first was the 1835 attempt on President Andrew Jackson. Both of the assassin’s guns misfired, and Jackson then beat the man with his cane.
President Theodore Roosevelt, who became president after McKinley’s death, was shot in the chest while campaigning in 1912. Knowing his injury wasn’t fatal, Roosevelt delivered an 84-minute speech before seeking medical attention.
On February 15, 1933, a man fired five shots at President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt. The shots missed Roosevelt but hit five other people, including Chicago mayor Anton Cermak, who was killed.
Every president since President Richard Nixon has been the target of assassination plots, most of which were foiled before the suspect could take any action. One failed attempt, however, led to another attempt on a presidential candidate.
Arthur Bremer traveled to Canada to try to shoot Nixon on April 13, 1972, but the president’s motorcade moved too fast for Bremer to get off a shot. A month later, Bremer shot Alabama Gov. George Wallace, who was paralyzed from the waist down.