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On July 13, 2024,Evan Vucci, an Americanphotojournalist, captured a series of photographs ofDonald Trump—then a formerpresident of the United States and thepresumptive nominee of theRepublican Party in the2024 presidential election—raising his right fist with blood on his face, moments after Trump was shot in the ear duringan assassination attempt at a political rally nearButler, Pennsylvania. In some photos, Trump's mouth is open as he chants "Fight!", while it is closed in others.
The photographs, taken by Vucci for theAssociated Press, were widely shared on social media and received substantial press coverage. Their composition, featuring a prominentAmerican flag behind Trump, was praised by commentators, who compared Vucci's photographs to several other iconic historical images and predicted that they would come to represent Trump and his 2024 election victory.
Donald Trump, then a formerpresident of the United States who was thepresumptive nominee of theRepublican Party in the2024 United States presidential election, held arally for his presidential campaign nearButler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024.[1][2][3] Shortly after the rally began,Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire at Trump inan assassination attempt;[4] Trump survived, though his ear was injured by a bullet, bloodying his face.[4][5][6]
Evan Vucci, the chiefphotojournalist of theAssociated Press (AP) inWashington, D.C., was one of four photographers stationed in a buffer area near the stage where Trump spoke during the rally.[5][7] Vucci had covered Trump since 2015 and had photographed hundreds of political rallies.[5][8][9] He previously covered theWar in Afghanistan and theIraq War,[5][8][10] and he took a well-known 2008 photograph ofan Iraqi journalist throwing his shoes at then-U.S. presidentGeorge W. Bush.[4][10] In 2021, he won thePulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography as part of an AP team covering theGeorge Floyd protests.[1][7][11]
After shots began to be fired at the rally, Vucci sawUnited States Secret Service agents in Trump'ssecurity detail rush towards the former president, so he ran to find a better vantage point and began photographing.[1][4][5][7] He later recounted that he "knew right away" that it was an attempt to assassinate Trump,[8] and that he "knew it was a moment in American history and it had to be documented".[1][6] Of the situation, Vucci recounted:
It was a situation where that vast experience absolutely does [prepare you]. To have that experience behind you sort of allows you to remain calm. ... In my head, I just kept saying to myself, 'slow down, slow down. Compose, compose.' Okay, what's gonna happen next? What's going on here? What's going on there? Just trying to get every angle on it.[8]
Evan Vucci's photographs show Trump moments after he stood up after being shot in the ear during an assassination attempt. Hisright fist is raised into the air in defiance and blood is streaked across his face. He is surrounded by Secret Service agents on his security detail, one of whom,Sean M. Curran, stares at the camera. A largeflag of the United States waves in the background of the photos, in front of a clear blue sky.[1][2][3][4][5][7][11] Trump holds a redMAGA hat that reads "Make America Great Again"—his signature slogan—in his left hand.[12][13][14] In some of Vucci's photographs, Trump's mouth is open as he either mouths[15][16] or shouts "Fight!";[2][4][7][11][14] in other photos, Trump's lips are pursed.[1][5][12][13]
Other photographers in the press gallery also took photos of Trump during the assassination attempt.[3][17] A photograph byDoug Mills ofThe New York Times appeared to show a bullet streaking past Trump's head,[18][19] Anna Moneymaker, a photographer forGetty Images, captured a photo of Trump on the ground with blood trickling over his face immediately after the shooting, underneath Secret Service agents who were on top of him.[3][17][19]
InThe Conversation, Sara Oscar described numerous elements she said made Vucci's work "such a powerful image": The agents form[ing] a triangular composition that places Trump at the vertex; ... The agent draw[ing] us into the image, he looks back at us, he sees the photographer and therefore, he seems to see us; ... Set against a blue sky, everything else in the image is red, white and navy blue. The trickles of blood falling down Trump's face are echoed in the red stripes of the American flag which aligns with the republican red of the podium."[20]
Philip Kennicott, writing forThe Washington Post, described Vucci's photographs as "Densely packed with markers ofnationalism and authority" such as "the flag, the blood, the urgent faces of federal agents in dark suits". He described one of the closed-mouth photos as "strongly constructed, with aggressive angles that reflect the chaos and drama of the moment, and a powerful balance of color, all red, white and blue, including the azure sky above and the red-and-white decorative banner below. Trump seems to emerge from within a deconstructed version of its basic colors."[13]
The photographs of Trump were quickly shared widely on the internet,[5][7] circulated by Republicans and Trump's allies[2] and appeared ininternet memes.[21][22] The photos appeared on the front pages of newspapers across the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia.[5] Two days after the assassination attempt, Vucci's photos were called "already iconic";[20] Patrick Witty, a former photo editor atTime,The New York Times, andNational Geographic, said "Without question, Evan's photo will become the definitive photo from the [assassination] attempt" because it "captures a range of complex details and emotions in one still image".[19] AP customers used two of the photos 4,100 times the day after the shooting, compared to 700–800 times for a typical week's most-used photo.[23]
Many compared the photographs of Trump to historical patriotic images, most prominentlyRaising the Flag on Iwo Jima, a 1945 photograph byJoe Rosenthal ofU.S. Marines raising the American flag duringWorld War II.[1][21][24]The New York Times art and culture crisis Jason Farago said that Trump's raised first suggested "fearlessness and indomitability". He compared photos of the assassination attempt by Vucci, Mills, Moneymaker, and aReuters photographer to historical paintings:Liberty Leading the People (1830) of theJuly Revolution in France byEugène Delacroix; andThe Death of Major Peirson (1783), byJohn Singleton Copley during theAmerican Revolution.[21]
The photographs were taken as evidence of Trump's strong media instincts because he understood the opportunity to leverage the crisis into a strong appearance even during the shock of the moment.[22] On July 14, the day after the assassination attempt, Trump toldThe New York Post: "A lot of people say it's the most iconic photo they've ever seen. They're right and I didn't die. Usually you have to die to have an iconic picture."[25][26]Trump's presidential campaign used images of the assassination attempt to solicit donations.[27] InThe Daily Telegraph, Roland Oliphant wrote that Trump "could not have looked more like an American hero if he tried", calling Vucci's photos "a product of world-class photojournalism—and also, perhaps, of Trump's innate political instincts."[10]
The press gallery photographers were commended for their bravery in running towards the stage to take the photos after shots were fired.[3]Axios writer Aïda Amer said that notable images by Vucci, Moneymaker, and Mills quickly became known in newsrooms as the "Evan photo", "Anna photo", and "the bullet photo", respectively.[28] Amer also reported that "Multiple photographers worried privately that the images from the rally could turn into a kind of 'photoganda'" for Trump's campaign, and that one told her it was "dangerous" for the media to continue using the Vucci photo "despite how good it is", because it was "freeP.R. for Trump" that made him a "martyr".[28]
InDeutsche Welle, Carla Bleiker called one of Vucci's photographs an "image for the history books", describing it as a "declaration of defiance in the face of adversity" and noting the cultural importance of the U.S. flag in the image, especially forconservative Americans.[1]Fraser Nelson ofThe Spectator wrote that "[any critic] would have instantly recognised" Vucci's photos as "a once-in-a-generation photograph—an image that will become one of the most potent in American politics and history" and "be remembered as one of the most important political photographs ever taken." He called Vucci's work photojournalism at its most powerful".[14] InThe Atlantic, Tyler Austin Harper said Vucci's photos "became immediately legendary", and that "However you feel about the man at its center, it is undeniably one of the great compositions in U.S. photographic history." He said that it was not "an exaggeration to say that the photo is nearly perfect, one captured under extreme duress and that distills the essence of a man in all his contradictions."[11]
Jonathan Jones, an art critic writing forThe Guardian, compared the photographs to "timeless patriotic images" includingRaising the Flag on Iwo Jima andWashington Crossing the Delaware (1851) byEmanuel Leutze. Drawing similarities to religious works, includingDescent from the Cross (c. 1435) andThe Entombment of Christ (1603–1604), he wrote: "There is something genuinely uncanny, not quite explicable, about this image: how a scene with such deep meanings and a positively religious suggestiveness can happen spontaneously."[24] Philipp Kennicott said the pictures "could change America forever", predicting that it would encourage further political violence by "creat[ing] a reality more real than reality, transforming the chaos and messiness of a few moments of peril onstage in Pennsylvania into a surpassing icon of Trump's courage, resolve and heroism."[13]Timothy Garton Ash wrote that the photograph would "change the course of history of the world",[14] and commentators suggested it could help Trump win the 2024 election.[11][23][24]
British journalistPiers Morgan wrote that Vucci's work was "Already one of the most iconic photographs in American history".[23] Many other journalists expressed similar sentiments; Ashima Grover ofHindustan Times described one of the photos as a "legendary American photo for posterity",[5] and inIndia Today, Yudhajit Shankar Das anticipated that Vucci's work would be considered a "defining photograph of U.S. history".[29]The Washington Post writer Jeremy Barr also said Vucci's photos were "sure to go down in the pantheon of American photography",[7] while Geordie Gray wrote inThe Australian that the photos were "destined to become one of the defining images of our time".[4] Writing forThe New Yorker, Benjamin Wallace-Wells said the pictures were "already the indelible image of our era of political crisis and conflict." Discussing how the photographs depicted Trump, he concluded: "It is an image that captures him as he would like to be seen, so perfectly, in fact, that it may outlast all the rest."[12]
Trump went on to win the U.S. presidential election in November 2024; after his victory,The New York Times said that the "images of him bleeding after a failed assassination attempt became the symbol of what supporters saw as a campaign of destiny."[30] In December 2024,The Guardian named Vucci's photograph of Trump after the assassination attempt one of the "photographs that defined 2024".[9] Regarding the legacy of his photographs, Vucci said:
My job is to show you the world through my eyes. I try to do it professionally, fairly, and I feel like I did that in the moment. The reaction to the photograph afterwards is out of my control. As far as people saying that photograph won Trump the election, I would have to push back on that. I think people have very real problems and very real issues, and I feel that for someone to vote based on a photograph is ridiculous.[9]
Ahead of thesecond inauguration of Trump on January 20, 2025, American sculptorAlan Cottrill unveiledDon Colossus, a 15-foot (4.6-meter) bronze statue of Trump modeled after Vucci's raised-fist photographs of Trump during the assassination attempt.[31][32] The statue was commissioned by a group of Trump's supporters in August 2024, who paid Cottrill around $400,000 for the project;[31] it is intended to "tour the country" before being permanently placed at the futureDonald J. Trump Presidential Library.[32]
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