BUTLER: Supporters knelt and others bowed their heads as Donald Trump led a moment of silence at 6:11 pm, the time when shots rang out at a rally in the same rural Pennsylvania showground exactly 12 weeks earlier.
An opera singer belted out “Ave Maria” as a Secret Service sniper scanned the horizon with binoculars and a surveillance drone hovered above the tens of thousands of rallygoers. Heavily armed officers patrolled behind the stage.
The crowd in Butler periodically erupted into chants of “fight, fight, fight” — echoing Trump’s rallying cry just after the July 13 shooting that grazed his ear and briefly upended the campaign for November’s election.
“I love the fact that he came back… He said he’d come back to finish his speech, and to me (that takes) guts,” said Robert Dupain, 53, a local construction worker who was at the July rally.
“That’s what (these) 50,000 people stand for,” said Dupain, who described having “nervous excitement all week” about attending.
Though there was no official count, Saturday’s rally was significantly better attended than the previous one.
Trump’s return to Butler, a deeply conservative community in the key swing state of Pennsylvania, was marked by noticeably tighter security.
“As I was saying,” Trump said to laughter from behind bulletproof glass as he began his speech, riffing on the violent interruption to his July monologue.
The same chart towards which Trump turned his head at the moment the would-be assassin open fired three months ago was also flashed up on a big screen Saturday, to cheers.
In a typically meandering speech, Trump repeated lies about immigration, transgender athletes and his political opponents.
The would-be assassin had fired from a complex of buildings left outside the security perimeter, despite its proximity to Trump’s podium. It was ringed by state police on Saturday. Trucks were also parked around the venue, blocking potential sightlines.
