The New York Times called the assassination attempt on former President Trump "antithetical" to the idea of America in an editorial published Saturday evening.
"Americans received a sobering reminder on Saturday of the threat that political violence poses to our democracy," the editorial, headlined "The Attack on Donald Trump Is Antithetical to America," read. "It is a mercy that Donald Trump was not seriously injured by gunfire at an evening campaign rally in Butler, a Pennsylvania city north of Pittsburgh, and a tragedy that at least one person at the rally was killed. We hope that Mr. Trump recovers quickly and fully."
The editorial board called any attempt to resolve an election through violence "abhorrent."
The shooter has been identified by the FBI as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old man from western Pennsylvania. Crooks reportedly shot Trump from a rooftop around 130 yards away during a rally in the small town, striking the upper part of Trump’s right ear while the former president was speaking to rallygoers just after 6 p.m. on Saturday. Another rally attendee was killed, and two others were critically hurt. Crooks was killed by law enforcement shortly after the shooting began.
"Ballots, not bullets, should always be the means by which Americans work through their differences," the editorial board warned. "It is now incumbent on political leaders of both parties, and on Americans individually and collectively, to resist a slide into further violence and the type of extremist language that fuels it. Saturday’s attack should not be taken as a provocation or a justification."
The opinion piece repeatedly lambasted violence, which it said is "infecting and inflecting American political life."
FORMER PRESIDENT TRUMP SURVIVES ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT, FBI IDS SHOOTER AS THOMAS MATTHEW CROOKS
"Cultural and political polarization, the ubiquity of guns and the radicalizing power of the internet have all been contributing factors, as this board laid out in its editorial series The Danger Within in 2022," the article read.
"The attack on Saturday was a tragedy. The challenge now confronting Americans is to prevent this moment from becoming the beginning of a greater tragedy," the editorial concluded. "This election must be resolved by the votes Americans will cast."
The same board published a lengthy editorial just last week calling Trump "dangerous" and manifestly unfit for office. It has repeatedly denounced him as a threat to American democracy and urged voters not to give him another term.
"Mr. Trump has shown a character unworthy of the responsibilities of the presidency. He has demonstrated an utter lack of respect for the Constitution, the rule of law and the American people," the piece read. "Instead of a cogent vision for the country’s future, Mr. Trump is animated by a thirst for political power: to use the levers of government to advance his interests, satisfy his impulses and exact retribution against those who he thinks have wronged him."
Atop the interactive editorial, it wrote, "HE IS DANGEROUS IN WORD, DEED AND ACTION."
The New York Times "urge[d] voters to see the dangers of a second Trump term clearly and to reject it," calling him lacking in moral fitness, principled leadership, character and respect for the rule of law.
"What would Mr. Trump do in a second term? He has told Americans who he is and shown them what kind of leader he would be," the article concluded. "When someone fails so many foundational tests, you don’t give him the most important job in the world."
