In the opening remarks in accepting the 2024 Republican nomination for president, President Trump described the terrifying moment he knew he had been shot by a would-be assassin. He has asked for unity in the wake of this attack. 

“I’m not supposed to be here tonight,” Mr. Trump said, which made the crowd of thousands chant: “Yes you are!”

“We rise together or we fall apart,” Mr. Trump said at the top of his speech. “I am running to be president for all of America — not half of America — because there is no victory in winning for half of America.” He said he came to deliver “a message of confidence, strength, and hope.”

“So many people have asked me: ‘What happened?’” Trump said. He added that he would only tell the story of the attempted assassination once, because it was

“Too painful to tell.”

“It was a warm, beautiful day in the early evening … music was loudly playing, and the campaign was doing really well. I went to the stage and the crowd was cheering wildly,” “whizzing sound” “I said to myself: ‘Wow, what was that?’”

“My hand was covered with blood. I immediately knew it was very serious, that we were under attack. Very brave secret service agents. I felt very safe because I had God on my side.”

Former first lady Melania Trump has joined her husband at the Republican National Convention ahead of his address accepting the party’s nomination for president. It is Mrs. Trump’s first public political appearance in months. 

She has largely been absent from the public eye since leaving the White House in 2021, and makes history this year as the first spouse of a presidential candidate to not address the party convention since 1992. 

Mrs. Trump has attended none of her husband’s rallies since he announced his candidacy in late 2022, nor did she accompany him to any of his court appearances in recent months. 

The former first lady walked into the convention hall on Thursday night just before her husband took the stage to accept the nomination. She entered the room after missing the first three days wearing a red dress, accompanied by classical music. 

After the attempt on her husband’s life on Saturday, Mrs. Trump issued a lengthy statement about how impacted she and her son Barron — the only child she shares with the former president — were.

“When I watched that violent bullet strike my husband, Donald, I realized my life, and Barron’s life, were on the brink of devastating change. I am grateful to have brave secret service agents and law enforcement officials who risked their own lives to protect my husband,” she wrote in her statement on Sunday. 

Her most high-profile event since leaving the White House was attending the funeral of former first lady Rosalyn Carter, where she was joined by all living first ladies, along with President Biden and President Clinton. According to the New York Times, Mrs. Trump and first lady Jill Biden have remained in touch since 2021, going so far as to exchange birthday cards. 

After his call for unity and the recounting of his brush with death, Trump laid the gauntlet down for Democrats, demanding the indictments levied against him be dropped, especially in the wake of Judge Aileen Cannon’s decision to throw out the classified documents case on the grounds that Special Counsel Jack Smith was appointed improperly. 

“If Democrats want to unify our country, they should drop these partisan witch hunts.” Trump demanded an election that is “worthy of our people” be held without any legal issues hanging over him.

Without mentioning President Biden by name — referring only to “the administration” — Trump argued that there are a number of crises facing America that demand immediate action by him and him alone. 

“We are a nation in decline,” the former — and likely future — president warned. He listed inflation, the immigration crisis that has brought “misery, poverty, crime, and disease”, and a series of international conflicts that “a world has seldom been part of.”

Trump made the promise to “drill, baby, drill” and lower tax rates. The reforms in his own tax reform bill, signed in 2017, expire next year, and will be a key legislative battle in 2025.