Trump assassination attempt: The many motives behind US political violence
While the motives of some of the US politicians’ assassins have never been determined, it is safe to say that US political violence is rooted in diverse ‘killer’ motives – ranging from political and ideological reasons to personal grievances and mental illness
As of this writing, the motive behind former US president Donald Trump's assassination attempt remains unclear. Investigators continue to try to understand why the 20-year-old registered Republican voter and Pennsylvanian Thomas Crooks caused the Trump rally shooting.
On the heels of this "historic" event, the history of America's "political violence" comes to the fore in global discourse. While the long list of problematic assassination attempts against US presidents and presidential candidates stain the history of America, other prolific political figures were also gunned down – telling of the scope of the political turmoil on US soil.
"'This is not who we are, America' – just doesn't ring true to me," wrote Bernice King, lawyer, minister and the youngest child of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr and Coretta Scott King, on X (formerly known as Twitter).
"This is not who we should be. With that honest statement about our culture of violence, political and otherwise, we can rise up to eradicate injustice and violence, and reform our rhetoric," she added.
Keep updated, follow The Business Standard's Google news channel
Martin Luther King Jr was shot dead on a motel balcony in Memphis on 4 April 1968.
While some of the assassins' motives have been studied and established, some remain uncertain. But it is safe to say that US political violence is rooted in diverse 'killer' motives behind assassination attempts – ranging from political and ideological reasons to personal grievances and mental illness.
The case of political and ideological motives
On 14 April 1865, US President Abraham Lincoln was shot in the back of his head from point-blank range in a theatre – marking the first successful assassination attempt of this degree. Lincoln's murderer John Wilkes Booth, was a former actor and, according to reports, a "fervent supporter of the pro-slavery Confederate side in the US Civil War, which was ongoing at the time."
The 26-year-old Booth loathed Lincoln "for his anti-slavery stance and for waging war against the South" and he did not act alone. His four co-conspirators (all Confederate agents or sympathisers) also planned – but failed – to assassinate Secretary of State William Seward and Vice President Andrew Johnson.
The motive was clear in this instance. Booth was captured some days later in the same month. His four co-conspirators (some reports cite more than four) were hanged in July 1865.
On 6 September 1901, another US president, William McKinley, fell victim to bullets — marking the third successful assassination attempt. McKinley was shot during a speaking tour in Buffalo, New York. He would survive but die later from infections later in the month.
The 28-year-old assassin Leon F Czolgosz was an American self-proclaimed anarchist. "Chief executive victim of most cowardly anarchist" headline ran in The San Francisco Call newspaper after the event.
Czolgosz was reportedly extremely affected by "the growing social and economic divide in the US" and the 1901 US president assassination "revealed an undercurrent of public dissatisfaction brewing beneath America's surface optimism," according to the History Channel.
However, after Lincoln, nothing quite measured in shock when US President John F Kennedy was shot dead on 22 November 1963. Kennedy was in a motorcade in Dallas.
Lee Harvard Oswald, the lone gunman, rose to infamy. After six decades, conspiracy theories still shroud the Kennedy assassination mystery.
One of the most popular conspiracy theories is rooted in how Oswald's Mexico City visit (before killing Kennedy) had not been properly investigated. Oswald reportedly visited Soviet and Cuban embassies during his visit.
Philip Shenon, an investigative reporter for The New York Times and author, wrote in Politico Magazine in 2015, "What happened in Mexico City in the weeks before JFK's murder? It is clear from government files declassified in recent decades that Oswald's six-day trip to Mexico was never adequately investigated by the CIA, the FBI and the State Department—and, as a result, by the Warren Commission, the panel named by President Lyndon Johnson to investigate the assassination."
The theory is primarily based on the rationale that it was improbable for Oswald alone to carry out such a high-profile murder of the youngest-elected US president and the most protected man in the US. And it hinges on the idea of a foreign conspiracy to kill Kennedy.
"David Slawson [the Warren Commission's chief investigator] believes the CIA was desperate to shut down any investigation in Mexico City out of fear the Warren Commission might stumble onto evidence of the spy agency's long-running schemes to murder Fidel Castro," wrote Shenon.
Oswald, a US Marine veteran, was apprehended a couple of days later. He was shot dead on live television by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner. Oswald's death also supports a lot of the conspiracy theorists' claim that he was just a "patsy" in the grand scheme of a murder plot.
The Kennedy family was still not out of the woods. On 5 June 1968, US presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy (also JFK's nephew), was shot by Sirhan Sirhan, a Palestinian Arab.
Sirhan was reportedly angered by Kennedy's pro-Israel stance and his support for military aid to Israel. He targeted Kennedy due to his foreign policy positions and perceived influence on US involvement in the Middle East.
At the time, RFK was a leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination. He died the following day on 6 June 1968.
Around 11 other US presidents (including Bill Clinton and George W Bush) were targeted for assassination. In fact, Abraham Lincoln and John F Kennedy survived previous assassination attempts before they met their death.
In November 1950, two gunmen broke into Blair House across the street from the White House, to kill US President Harry S Truman. Assailants Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola were Puerto Rican nationalists who wanted to draw attention to the independence movement.
Truman was uninjured.
In late April 1993, the US learned that terrorists had attempted to assassinate US President George H W Bush during his visit to Kuwait. The Kuwaiti authorities arrested 17 persons suspected in the plot to kill Bush using explosives hidden in a Toyota Landcruiser.
Reportedly, the plot was organised by Iraqi intelligence, and aimed to retaliate against Bush for his role in the Gulf War and the defeat of Iraq.
The case of mental illness
On 30 January 1835, Richard Lawrence's gun misfired twice at a funeral, where he attempted to kill President Andrew Jackson. Lawrence wanted to kill Jackson because he believed that the president was preventing him from becoming the King of England.
Jackson survived. Lawrence was later found to be mentally ill.
On 14 October 1912, John Schrank wanted to kill the then-US president Theodore Roosevelt. Why? Schrank claimed that the ghost of William McKinley (who had been assassinated) had instructed him to kill Roosevelt.
Roosevelt survived. Schrank was found to be mentally unstable.
On 5 September 1975, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme attempted to kill US President Gerald Ford. Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson, wanted to make a statement about environmental issues and draw attention to Manson's imprisonment.
Another woman, Sara Jane Moore, confronted Ford outside a hotel in San Francisco. Moore fired one shot and missed. Moore was angry at the president and "immersed in the Vietnam war and believed the country needed a change."
In both cases, Ford was uninjured and the two assailants were sentenced to prison.
But perhaps one of the more delusional motives is that of John Jinckley Jr. He wanted to kill US President Ronald Reagan on 30 March 1981 in order to impress actress Jodie Foster, with whom he was obsessed. He believed that assassinating Reagan would capture her attention.
The case of personal grievances
American president James A Garfield was shot at a train station by 39-year-old Charles J Guiteau on 2 July 1881. Garfield would survive but later die from infections related to his wound in September of the same year.
"Guiteau was known around Washington as an emotionally disturbed man. He had killed Garfield because of the President's refusal to appoint him to a European consulship. In planning this violent act, Guiteau stalked Garfield for weeks," according to the University of Virginia's The Miller Centre specialising in political history.
Guiteau, a writer and lawyer by profession, was convicted for Garfield's death and executed in 1882.
On 22 February 1974, Samuel Byck planned to hijack a plane and crash it into the White House to kill US President Richard Nixon. Byck, reportedly, was driven by his belief that the government was oppressing the American people and causing his personal failures.
More 'gunned down' moments
Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X are two of the other high-profile assassinations in US political history.
In 2018, the Washington Post story titled "Who killed Martin Luther King Jr? His family believes James Earl Ray was framed" questioned what happened on the fateful April day in 1968.
The revered civil rights movement leader was shot and killed by James Earl Ray, who, reportedly, was a "small-time criminal and racist."
Earlier, on 21 February 1965, Malcolm X (human rights activist) was killed by, reportedly, members of the Nation of Islam. It was Malcolm's break from the black nationalist, religious and political organisation and his subsequent criticisms of its leader Elijah Muhammad, which are believed to be the motivation behind the 1965 February assassination.
In 1978, Harvey Milk – the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors – was assassinated by Dan White, a former city supervisor. Reportedly, White had personal and political grievances against Milk and Mayor George Moscone, whom he also killed.
America's Black Panther chapter in the 1960s and 1970s is another "moment" in US political history.
For the uninitiated, Black Panther was a political organisation led by college students Huey P Newton, Eldridge Cleaver and Bobby Seale spoke and based on a 10-point programme they wanted from the administration centring on full employment, decent housing and education, an end to police brutality, and black people to be exempt from the military, etc.
One of the most pivotal moments in this chapter was the killing of 21-year-old Fred Hampton.
In a pre-dawn raid on Hampton's Chicago apartment by the Chicago Police Department coordinated with the FBI, the police fired nearly 100 shots into the apartment.
Hampton, the chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, was shot while he lay in bed. Mark Clark, another Panther, was also killed.
The police initially claimed they were responding to gunfire from inside the apartment, but evidence later showed that the Panthers fired only one shot, and the raid was premeditated.
The FBI viewed Hampton as a significant threat due to his ability to unite various black and white revolutionary groups. Documents revealed that the FBI aimed to "prevent the rise of a messiah" who could unify and electrify the black nationalist movement.
Fast forward to 13 July 2024.
The FBI said they have reason to believe Thomas Crooks acted alone. Whatever the findings may be in the following days, perhaps America will do well to pay heed to Bernice King's words "This is not who we [America] should be" – and genuinely change the future course of politics in America and move past its violent past.
